Ideals 


Effects,  Cause,  and  Remedy  for 
the  Afro-American  Race 
Troubles. 


BY  EX-CONGRESSMAN 
GEORGE  W.  MURRAY 


PRICE.  PER  COPY,  25  CENTS 


RACE  IDEALS 


EFFECTS,  CAUSE,  AND  REMEDY 

For  the  Afro-American  Race  Troubles 


BY 

Ex-Congressman  GEO.  W.  MURRAY 


COPYRIGHT  1910 
By  Geo.  W.  MURRAY. 


INTRODUCTORY. 


Many  books  are  written  merely  for  the  gratification  of  sentiment, 
without  utility  to  the  reader  in  any  sense;  but!  here  is  a book  which, 
if  properly  interpreted,  will  mean  vastly  more  than  any  literary  effort 
of  the  race,  in  all  its  history. 

Its  teachings  presage  this  deep  import  of  Armstrong,  that  “the 
praise  that ’s  worth  ambition  is  attained  by  sense  alone,  and  dignity 
of  mind,”  and  coupled  with  that  of  Goldsmith,  who  said: 

“For  just  experience  tells  in  every  soil. 

That  those  who  think  will  govern  those  who  toil.” 

The  searcher  after  truth  will  find  in  these  pages  the  philosophy  of 
life  as  it  pertains  to  the  Afro-American. 

Philosophy  governs  society.  Philosophy  has  accepted  the  doctrine 
of  Hobbs,  that  “in  the  existence  of  all  things  that  have  life  there  is  a 
struggle,”  and  it  concludes  with  Darwin  that  “only  the  fittest  survive.” 

When  it  is  considered  that  within  forty-five  years  the  Afro-Amer- 
ican has  met  and  answered  every  call  made  on  him  by  the  fiercest  and 
most  exacting  civilization  ever  known  to  mankind,  and  that  he  has 
done  it  against  the  greatest  odds,  manifested  in  the  dark  cloud  of  ap- 
palling ignorance,  the  odium  of  having  been  enslaved,  and  taught  to 
feel  the  blighting  curse  of  such  a doom  upon  his  skin,  the  huge  ob- 
struction fostered  by  human  prejudice,  and  insecurity  nurtured  by 
hate  and  infamy  ever  active  at  his  heels,  with  the  Alps  ever  before 
him,  inexperienced  in  the  arts  of  freedom,  with  sore  and  bleeding  un- 
tried feet,  the  aching  stoop  brought  on  by  centuries,  and  the  dread  of 
failure  ever  in  his  heart,  furnishes  the  world  one  of  its  greatest 
paradoxes. 

Great  God,  what  hellish  furv  was  injected  in  his  veins! 

What  paganism  wrought  to  wreck  his  soul ! 

What  devastating  lust  to  leave  its  ugly  stains ! 

What  was  there  in  him  left  that  wasn’t  stole? 

Through  arts  of  deep  damnation  well  covered  by  deceit. 

He  was  doomed  to  run  the  gauntlet  of  despair, 

To  suffer  through  the  ages  this  most  unholy  cheat. 

His  flickering  light  of  hope  was  in  a prayer. 

Tt  is  to  be  regarded  in  the  light  of  this  emphasized  progress  of  a 
race  long  wronged,  and  limited  in  the  sphere  of  social,  political,  in- 
dustrial, and  economic  prowess  by  the  constantly  cruel  usages  of  a 


4 


RACE  IDEALS. 


horrible  tyranny,  that  the  tangible  things  of  life  were  to  be  seized  on 
first,  before  anything  could  be  done  through  the  process  of  a mental 
awakening.  The  substance  upon  which  soul  and  body  depended,  while 
in  quest  of  something  higher  up,  had  to  come  out  of  the  earth  to  feed 
the  stomach  and  clothe  the  body  until  a prouder  day,  when  perad- 
venturc  it  could  see  itself  in  the  looking-glass,  be  pleased,  and  go  off 
to  college  to  wifi  honors  and  scholarships. 

The  material  battle  had  to  be  fought  and  won  in  the  fiercest  com- 
petition with  labor  first,  before  the  day  of  the  spun-gilt  verbiage  of 
rhetoric  should  mould  the  forbidden  lips  of  Afro-Americans  into  shape 
for  gracious  utterance. 

My  friend  ex-Congressman  Geo.  W.  Murray  has  indeed  forged 
along  the  highway  of  thought.  He  has  analyzed  racial  conditions  in 
the  laboratory  of  his  keen  mind,  and  given  us  the  richest  results  of  his 
patient  and  painstaking  investigation.  The  truth  is  to  hand.  It  is  not 
to  be  embellished  by  any  fictitious  effort,  nor  fostered  bv  any  proclama- 
tions of  wonder. 

The  Afro-American  problem,  if  there  is  any  problem,  is  more 
simple  than  complex;  it  is  merely  the  decent  and  honorable  accepta- 
tion of  truth  encouched  in  the  Golden  Rule. 

It  is  the  natural  order  of  Afro-American  preservation,  which  is 
Nature’s  first  law. 

In  the  contemplation  of  the  subject,  which  has  lain  heavily  upon 
the  author’s  mind  and  fastened  its  hold  upon  his  great  big  racial 
heart,  it  appears  that  Lowell’s  lines  more  deeply  inspired  him,  and 
methinks  I hear  him  make  acknowledgment  as  he  trudges  along  the 
corridor  of  mental  analysis: 

“In  life’s  small  things,  be  resolute  and  great, 

To  keep  thy  muscles  trained; 

Ivnowest  thou  when  Fate  thy  measure  takes, 

Or  when  she  ’ll  say  to  thee, 

‘I  find  thee  worthy ; do  this  thing  for  me’  ?” 

Mr.  Murray  is  a scholar,  who  has  crossed  the  pons  asinorum, 
lisped  upon  forbidden  lips  the  spun-gilt  verbiage  of  rhetoric  in  gra- 
cious utterance. 

He  has  sat  in  the  U.  S.  House  of  Representatives,  where,  in  sin- 
gle combat,  he  thundered  against  the  haughty  hand  of  oppression  with 
listening  Senate  to  attend.  He  is  intensely  racial,  although  intensely 
American;  he  has  not  departed  from  the  principles  that  vouchsafe 
the  tenets  and  doctrines  of  such  amendments  to  our  national  Consti- 


INTRODUCTORY. 


5 


tution  that  uphold  the  rights,  privileges,  and  immunities  to  all  men 
alike. 

He  is  in  deed  and  in  truth  a statesman  of  whom  the  race  is  proud. 

The  contents  of  this  book,  diminutive  in  size,  but  colossal  in  the 
truths  it  sets  forth,  will  inform  the  races  of  men  that  although 

We  do  not  walk  upon  the  wall 

Nor  hold  the  golden  keys  of  Fate, 

That  we  may  come  at  Wisdom’s  call, 

And  enter  through  her  gate. 

Let  us  hope  that  the  doctrine  it  teaches  may  be  accepted,  and 
its  truths  shine  out  in  all  their  beauty  in  the  lives  of  thousands,  who 
will  find  themselves  in  its  serious  perusal  and  awake  to  their  ennobling 
duties. 

Then  indeed  will  have  dawned  a new  day,  when  the  Afro- 
American  will  have  redeemed  himself  from  the  anathemas  of  his 
enemies  and  set  up  shop  in  all  the  multiplicity  of  avenues  of  com- 
merce, taking  as  his  sure  guide  the  fundamental  rules  of  arithmetic 
as  a compass  that  will  acquaint  on  the  great  sea  of  business  ad- 
venture. 

It  is  the  duty  to  his  unborn  generations  to  prepare  for  them  a 
name  which  they  in  all  future  years  may  wear  with  honor. 

He  is  to  succeed  by  the  adoption  of  such  principles  as  will  turn 
seeming  defeat  into  glorious  victory. 

He  is  to  explode  all  the  doctrines  that  have  puzzled  thousands  of 
wayfarers.  He  must  push  his  investigations  into  the  teeth  of  unto- 
ward circumstances,  and  take  his  place  in  every  avenue  of  painstaking 
effort,  wherever  human  foot  has  trodden  the  sod  or  human  thought 
evolved  an  idea. 

If  wisdom  is  our  lesson  (and  what  else  ennobles  man?),  what 
else  have  angels  learned? 

The  writer  is  solicitous  that  this  little  book  shall  go  forth  to  do 
a work  splendidly,  and  that  it  may  be  received  in  a noble  and  generous 
sense. 

Yours  for  the  race,  M.  A.  Majors,  M.D., 

Chicago,  111. 


RACE  IDEALS. 


PREFACE. 

With  a view  to  arousing  race  consciousness,  both  consciousness 
of  defects  and  power,  these  pages  are  dedicated  to  the  cause  of  the 
greatly  wronged  Afro-American  race,  which  is  suffering  for  want  of 
such  knowledge  of  the  cause  of,  and  remedy  for,  its  own  peculiar  trou- 
bles or  disease  as  would  enable  it  to  devise  and  apply  remedies  for 
its  own  relief,  as  well  as  the  means  of  enlightening  its  friends,  who, 
for  want  of  proper  knowledge,  have  failed  to  devise,  develop,  and 
prosecute  the  needed  system  for  the  proportional  development  of 
members  of  that  race,  and  for  want  of  proper  consideration  do  not 
see  that,  owing  to  previous  training  or  traditions,  the  system  of  train- 
ing given  the  race  is  unscientific  and  incomplete,  as  in  some  measure 
it  should  be  the  very  opposite  of  that  training  which  reduced  them  to 
their  present  state;  and  who,  because  the  system  has  failed  to  realize 
their  highest  expectation,  are  judging  him  harshly. 

That  such  a current  of  thought  may  result  from  a perusal  of 
these  pages  as  will  make  the  race  so  conscious  of  both  its  defects  and 
power  that  it  will  discard  the  former  and  effectively  use  the  latter, 
and  cause  its  friends  to  realize  their  mistakes  in  efforts  to  aid  it,  as 
well  as  its  enemies  in  the  unwarranted  judgments  pronounced  against 
it;  and  with  the  further  hope  that  a careful  persual  of  these  pages 
will  convince  those  who  are  working  in  the  interest  of  the  Afro-Amer- 
ican race  that  a half-century  and  countless  treasure  and  energy  have 
been  wasted  in  efforts  to  change  white  public  opinion  in  relation  to 
that  race,  to  remove  effects  without  first  removing  the  cause  producing 
them,  found  in  traits  and  characteristics  which  long  years  of  training 
have  developed,  is  the  humble  and  fervent  prayer  of  the  author. 


The  Effects,  Cause,  and  Remedy  of  the  Afro- 
American  Race  Troubles. 


Part  I. 


EFFECTS. 

It  must  be  conceded  that  no  race  of  people  can  pass  through 
two  and  a half  centuries  of  cruel  and  relentless  training  for  the  bene- 
fit of  others  without  being,  to  a greater  or  lesser  extent,  injuriously 
affected.  / 

That  the  Afro-American  race,  thrown  into  such  a system  of 
training  for  such  a period  of  time,  developed  traits  and  characteristics 
at  variance  with  Nature’s  law,  and  peculiar  to  itself,  is  natural,  and 
we  designate  such  peculiar  traits  and  characteristics  the  disease  of 
the  race.  

Before  we  can  locate  the  nature  and  extent  of  the  ills  of  the 
Afro-American,  and  establish  how  far  adverse  training  and  influences 
have  carried  him  from  a normal  state,  we  shall  have  to  discover  by 
comparisons  how  far,  in  his  secondary  state  of  freedom,  he  differs 
from  man  in  an  original  state  of  freedom. 

That  can  best  be  done  by  comparing  the  ideals,  feelings,  and 
dispositions  of  the  Afro-American  with  those  of  man  in  an  original 
state,  whose  ideals,  feelings,  and  dispositions  are  what  Nature  made 
them,  as  they  have  not  been  disturbed  injuriously  by  the  art  of  man. 

The  question  may  be  asked,  “What  are  ideals?”  and  answered  by 
saying  that  ideals,  man’s  highest  conception  of  persons,  places,  things, 
or  qualities,  sometimes  visionary  and  unattainable,  are  the  heights  to 
which  individuals,  families,  races,  or  nations  aspire,  and  by  which 
they  are  most  largely  influenced. 

All  do  not  have  the  same  ideals,  nor  are  the  standards  of  ideals 
stationary. 

Like  plants,  ideals  are  susceptible  of  cultivation  and  development, 
and  their  various  standards  depend  upon  the  kind  of  cultivation  had 
in  their  production. 

In  a state  of  natural  freedom,  all  races  have  their  human  ideals, 
their  highest  conceptions  of  man,  in  themselves,  and  any  variation 
from  this  rule  indicates  that  Nature  has  been  disturbed. 


8 


RACE  IDEALS. 


A comparative  examination  will  show  how  far  adverse  training 
has  carried  the  Afro-American,  during  his  period  of  bondage,  from 
the  universal  law  of  self-appreciation,  so  predominating,  not  alone  in 
man  in  a natural  state  of  freedom,  but  in  every  living  thing. 

If  there  is  self-depreciation  and  a want  of  self-preservation  in- 
stead, we  must  learn  to  what  extent  he  has  been  warped,  and  the 
means  used,  before  we  are  prepared  to  use  countervailing  influences  as 
a means  of  his  rehabilitation;  learn  how  far  his  adverse  training  has 
carried  him  from  the  normal  latitude  and  longitude  of  human  nature. 

In  order  to  do  this,  we  will  start  with  man  after  the  Flood, 
when,  according  to  the  nature  of  things,  he  had  only  one  standard 
of  ideals. 

We  are  told  by  the  sacred  Scriptures  that  when  Noah’s  ark  rested, 
there  were  only  eight  human  beings  on  earth — Noah  and  his  wife  and 
his  three  sons,  Ham,  Shem,  and  Japheth,  and  their  three  wives;  who, 
all  being  of  the  same  family,  must  have  had  the  same  physical  likeness. 
Their  texture  of  hair  and  complexion,  as  well  as  their  language,  cus- 
toms, and  manners,  must  have  been  the  same. 

Then  the  variations  seen  in  physical  likenesses,  languages,  customs, 
habits,  and  manners  can  only  be  accounted  for  by  the  variations  of 
climatic  effects,  and  other  natural  causes  and  conditions  to  which 
their  descendants  have  been  subjected  since  the  Flood,  evidences  of 
which  are  abundant  on  every  hand,  through  or  by  the  effect  which 
a short  change  of  climate  and  other  natural  conditions  have  upon  the 
physical  likeness,  language,  customs,  and  habits  of  individuals  under 
our  very  eyes. 

By  the  light  of  history,  the  ark  rested  in  the  southern  portion 
of  the  north  temperate  zone,  where  Shem,  Noah’s  second  son,  settled, 
and  hi?  descendants  retain  man’s  original  complexion,  yellow,  clay- 
colored,  Adam;  while  Ham,  Noah’s  eldest  son,  went  south  and  set- 
tled in  the  torrid  zone,  whose  burning  sun  crisped  the  hair  and  dark- 
ened the  complexion  of  his  descendants;  and  Japheth,  Noah’s  young- 
est son,  wrent  north  and  settled  in  the  northern  part  of  the  north  tem- 
perate or  the  southern  part  of  the  frigid  zone,  where,  after  the  lapse  of 
ages,  the  cold  bleached  the  complexion  and  hair  of  his  descendants. 

We  get  our  various  variations  from  greater  or  lesser  effects  of  the 
same  causes,  or  intermixtures. 

It  appears  that  the  three  brothers  located  at  such  distances  from 
each  other  and  the  means  of  communication  were  so  inadequate  that 
all  intercourse  among  their  descendants  wras  suspended  for  thousands 
of  years,  during  which  time  the  descendants  of  each  brother,  subjected 
to  peculiar  climatic  influences  and  other  forces  of  Nature  in  thpir 


EFFECTS. 


9 


isolated  regions,  prior  to  their  meeting  with  each  other,  had  developed 
not  only  different  physical  likenesses,  but  the  descendants  of  each  had 
also  developed  a language,  customs,  habits,  and  manners  peculiar  to 
themselves,  and  therefore  met  each  other  as  strange  beings. 

MAN  S IDEALS  IN  A NATURAL  STATE  OF  FREEDOM. 

So  that  when  the  children  of  each  brother  emerged  from  their 
isolated  homes  in  the  wilderness,  accustomed  to  see  only  persons  in 
their  own  physical  likeness,  to  hear  only  their  own  language  spoken, 
and  to  witness  only  their  own  customs,  habits,  and  manners,  they 
were  greatly  shocked  and  confused  at  meeting  their  cousins,  and  con- 
cluded that  the  differences  seen  were  brought  about  by  some  great 
misfortune  visited  upon  them. 

But  the  descendants  of  each  brother  soon  commenced  to  compare 
everything  connected  with  themselves,  whether  in  physical  likeness, 
custom,  habit,  or  manner,  with  everything  connected  with  their  cousins, 
and  concluded  that  theirs  were  the  proper  ones,  and  the  differences 
found  in  those  of  their  cousins  were  the  result  of  some  great  calamity. 

Therefore  the  members  of  each  tribe  saw  the  proper  man,  lan- 
guage, custom,  or  habit,  and  their  ideal  man,  their  highest  conception 
of  man,  only  in  themselves.  Such  are  the  conceptions  and  feelings 
engendered  by  Nature’s  God,  and  they  are  natural  and  proper,  and 
constitute  the  very  fountain  of  race,  pride,  self-appreciation,  and  self- 
preservation,  and  may  not  only  be  seen  in  man,  but  in  every  living 
thing. 

As  each  race’s  ideal  man  is  in  itself,  it  paints,  pictures,  or 
models  man  in  the  physical  likeness  of  its  own  members,  and  hav- 
ing no  higher  conception  of  the  forms  of  God  and  angels  than  the 
physical  form  of  its  own  members,  it  paints,  pictures,  or  models  the 
forms  of  God  and  angels  in  their  physical  likeness.  That  is,  the 
Chinese  God  or  angel  is  like  the  Chinaman,  the  Japanese  is  like  the 
Japanese,  the  African’s  is  like  the  African,  the  white  man’s  is  like  the 
white  man,  and  the  Indian’s  like  the  Indian. 

These  are  the  conceptions,  ideals,  and  feelings  which  Nature’s 
God  has  not  only  given  every  race  of  man,  but  every  living  thing,  a 
demonstration  of  which  mav  be  seen  as  clearly  in  the  self-appreciation 
and  self-defense  of  the  little  ant  as  was  seen  in  the  Japanese-Russian 
War;  and  any  variation  from  them  is  evidence  that  some  unnatural 
force  or  influence  has  interfered  with  or  arrested  Nature’s  law. 

Having  considered  man’s  conceptions,  ideals,  and  feelings  in  a 
state  of  natural  freedom,  and  how  he  is  governed  by  them,  we  will 
proceed  to  consider  those  of  the  Afro-American  in  his  secondary  state 


10 


RACE  IDEALS. 


of  freedom,  and  the  extent  to  which  he  differs  from  man  in  a natural 
state  of  freedom,  measures  the  depth  of  his  disease. 

We  will  now  proceed  to  examine  and  compare  his  ideals,  concep- 
tions, feelings,  and  disposition  with  those  of  man  in  a natural  state 
of  freedom,  in  order  to  concretely  locate  the  peculiar  symptoms  of  his 
disease,  that  it  may  be  properly  treated. 

To  serve  our  purpose,  we  give  the  following  illustrations  as  symp- 
toms of  his  disease : 

SYMPTOMS. 

(1)  The  white  man,  among  whom  Afro-Americans  have  dwelt 
for  the  last  three  hundred  years,  and  who  is  responsible  for  every 
peculiar  trait  and  characteristic  exhibited  by  them,  and  by  whom 
they  were  kept  in  such  ignorance  that  they  could  neither  paint,  pict- 
ure, nor  model  themselves  nor  anything  else,  models  the  most  highly 
developed  members  of  his  race  in  the  shape  of  artistic  doll  models, 
and  places  them  on  sale. 

With  two  objects  in  view — one  to  amuse  his  offspring,  and  the 
other  to  keep  such  an  ideal  before  its  eyes  as  will  develop  a spirit 
that  will  be  proud  of  the  body  in  which  it  dwells,  and  the  race  with 
which  that  body  is  connected — he  visits  places  once  or  twice  a year 
where  these  models  are  kept,  and  buys  one  or  more. 

His  Afro-American  neighbor  in  imitation,  without  thinking  of 
psychological,  or  spiritual,  effects  of  pictures,  models,  or  ideals,  follows 
him  to  the  same  shop  with  only  one  object  in  view,  merely  to  amuse 
his  child,  and  feels  that  he  ought  to  have  the  same  thing  that  his  white 
neighbor’s  child  has. 

But  the  shop-keeper,  upon  his  approach,  believing  that,  like  the 
white  man,  he  would  follow  the  law  of  Nature  in  demanding  a model 
in  the  physical  likeness  of  his  infant,  reaches  under  the  counter  and 
draws  out  and  offers  him  a beautiful  model  in  the  exact  physical 
likeness  of  his  own  offspring,  whereupon  he  turns  his  back  on  the  shop- 
keeper in  anger  and  disgust,  declaring  that  in  offering  him  “that  old 
black  thing”  he  meant  to  insult  him,  and  demands  a model  in  the 
physical  likeness  of  a white  child;  and  thereby  he  begins  the  work  of 
developing  a white  spirit  in  a black  body,  which  at,  or  before,  matur- 
ity will  hate  the  body  that  carries  it  and  despise  the  race  with  which 
that  body  is  connected. 

As  this  disposition  is  not  shown  by  a member  of  any  other  race, 
even  including  the  native  African,  it  is  a deviation  from  Nature’s  law 
and  a symptom  of  a diseased  spirit,  the  influence  which  impelled  such 
disposilion. 

(2)  Photographers  declare  that  they  find  no  difference  in  tak- 


EFFECTS. 


11 


ing  the  pictures  of  whites  and  Afro-Americans,  except  that  they  can- 
not make  the  pictures  of  the  latter  white  enough  to  please  them. 

As  every  other  race  and  tribe  demand  paintings  or  pictures  of 
themselves  in  their  physical  likeness,  and  do  not  believe  that  they  are 
proper  unless  so  made,  the  feeling  which  impels  the  Afro-American  to 
demand  a picture  or  photograph  of  himself  in  the  physical  likeness  of 
another,  is  also  a symptom  of  a diseased  spirit. 

(3)  Another  symptom  of  a diseased  spirit  is  shown  in  the  fact 
that  the  Afro-American’s  ideal  employer  is  white,  and  that  he  deems 
it  an  unbearable  disgrace  to  serve  a member  of  his  own  race,  while  all 
other  tribes  and  nations,  in  their  state  of  natural  freedom,  rather 
serve  members  of  their  own  particular  tribes  than  any  others. 

This  feeling  has  made  the  industrial  captain  white  in  every  com- 
munity occupied  by  the  Afro-American,  unless  the  white  man  vol- 
untarily refused  to  enter  as  a competitor,  and  it  has  further  resulted 
in  leaving  all  the  profits  from  the  labor  of  Afro-Americans  with  mem- 
bers of  the  white  race,  giving  them  the  power  to  own  and  control  the 
wealth  of  the  industrial  community,  and  thereby  make  them  the 
political  and  social  masters.  It  is  this  principle  that  has  destroyed 
the  black  man’s  ballot  and  citizenship,  throughout  the  rural  commun- 
ities of  the  South,  and  he,  following  the  same  principle,  is  only  tol- 
erated in  the  North. 

(4)  Still  another  symptom  of  a diseased  spirit  is  shown  in  the 
fact  that  his  ideal  merchant  is  white,  because  of  which  the  same  goods 
have  less  value  to  him  in  the  possession  of  a member  of  his  race  than 
they  would  in  the  possession  of  his  ideal  white  merchant,  which  impels 
him  to  go  out  of  his  way  to  give  his  patronage  and  influence  to  his 
ideal  merchant,  right  in  the  face  of  the  fact  that  the  members  of  every 
other  race,  including  that  of  his  ideal  merchant,  are  universally  dis- 
criminating in  favor  of  members  of  their  own  tribe,  and  going  away 
out  of  their  way  to  reach  them. 

This  principle  causes  all  the  profits  from  the  patronage  of  the 
black  man  to  be  left  with  members  of  the  white  race,  as  well  as  the 
profits  from  that  of  its  own  members,  resulting  in  giving  that  race 
the  power  to  own  the  business  community,  and  making  its  members 
the  masters  of  its  political  and  social  welfare. 

This  is  the  second  reason  why  the  black  man  has  lost  his  influ- 
ence, ballot,  and  citizenship  in  communities  where  he  so  greatly  pre- 
ponderates in  numbers. 

(5)  His  ideal  lawyer,  doctor,  and  other  professional  men  are 
white  and  men  of  his  own  race,  however  well  qualified,  generally 


12 


RACE  WEALS. 


have  a hard  time  in  their  struggles  to  succeed  against  the  effects  of  hi» 
white  ideals,  while  the  members  of  all  other  races  and  tribes  are  exult- 
ing in  giving  their  patronage  and  praise  to  the  professional  men  of 
their  own  tribes,  who  are  made  in  a short  while  so  wealthy  and  in- 
fluential that  they  greatly  add  to  the  respectability  of  their  race,  and 
upon  whose  influence  members  of  their  race  rely  in  their  endeavors  to 
secure  political  preferment  in  town.  State,  or  nation. 

(6)  Among  all  races  and  tribes  except  the  Afro-American,  the 
ideal  man  or  woman  is  the  one  who  comes  nearest  representing  the 
purity  and  nobility  of  their  race,  while  the  pernicious  and  poisonous 
effect  cf  white  ideals  is  seen  in  all  Afro-American  gatherings,  or  or- 
ganizations, of  whatever  nature,  or  description. 

The  deadly  shadows  of  white  ideals  fall  like  the  shade  of  the 
upas-tree  over  the  entire  social  body  of  the  race,  in  which  the  in- 
dividual is  given  the  preference  who  most  nearly  approaches  to  the 
ideal  white  shade  of  complexion  in  nearly  all  organizations  among 
adults,  on  the  one  hand,  while  discriminations  are  made  among  the 
young  on  the  same  principle  in  schools,  dance-halls,  and  social  gather- 
ings of  all  kinds,  on  the  other ; which  impels  the  offspring  of  honorable 
wedlock  to  feel,  in  many  instances,  that  such  was  his  greatest  mis- 
fortune, while  the  issue  of  immoral  alliances  is  encouraged  to  feel  that 
such  was  his  greatest  fortune. 

The  propagation  and  encouragement  of  such  a spirit  can  only 
result  in  breeding  more  and  more  immorality,  and  the  feeling  en- 
gendered is  not  confined  to  any  particular  shade  of  complexion,  as  the 
race  is  unconsciously,  yet  generally,  impelled  by  it  from  the  darkest 
to  the  lightest  shade  of  complexion,  which  is  indeed  a very  wicked 
svmptcm  of  a diseased  spirit. 

(7)  While  all  men,  in  their  natural  state  of  freedom,  have  their 
ideal  God  and  angels  in  their  own  physical  likeness,  except  in  cases 
where  the  religion  of  another  race  with  its  ideal  God  is  inherited,  as 
is  the  case  with  the  Japanese,  who  inherited  the  old  Shinto  religion 
with  its  black  model  of  God,  developed  hy  the  ancient  Ethiopian  race, 
white  ideals,  with  their  traditional,  literary,  and  religious  training, 
have  filled  Afro-Americans  with  an  imaginary  Heaven  filled  with  a 
white  God  and  angels,  and  they  are  wondering  how  they  ever  will 
be  metamorphosed  into  beings  acceptable  to  the  occupants  of  such  a 
Heaven. 

(8)  Contrary  to  man’s  ideals  and  feelings  in  a natural  state 
of  freedom,  who  believes  that  everything  connected  with  him  is  the 
proper  and  right  thing,  while  the  Afro-American’s  own  hair  is  kinky 


EFFECTS. 


13 


or  crisped,  his  ideal  hair  is  straight,  and  the  inventor  or  owner  of 
the  hair-straightener  is  growing  rich  by  the  flood  of  money  pouring 
into  his  pocket  from  the  lean  purses  of  Afro-Americans;  and  his 
the  immediate  demand  of  the  Afro-American  for  straight  hair,  pome 
process  being  too  slow  at  times  to  meet  certain  emergencies  to  satisfy 
ghouls  enter  the  grave  and  rob  a dead  white  man  or  woman  of  his 
or  her  hair,  with  which  he  adorns  his  pate  and  marches  to  his  fete 
with  prouder  mien  than  he  ever  did  under  the  hair  which  Nature 
provided  him  with ; this,  being  unnatural,  is  another  symptom  of  a 
diseased  spirit. 

(9)  While  all  people  in  their  state  of  natural  freedom  have 
their  ideal  man  or  woman  among  the  members  of  their  own  race,  the 
Afro-American’s  ideal  woman  or  man  has  been  made  white  by  the 
training  of  the  white  man;  but  when  he  tries  to  reach  the  woman, 
whom  he  had  no  hand  in  making  his  ideal,  he  is  shot  down  like  a 
wild  beast  and  burnt  at  the  stake. 

When  the  spirit,  which  the  inordinate  appreciation  of  magnified 
white  ideals,  has  developed  in  the  Afro-American  man  and  woman, 
is  taken  into  consideration,  it  is  not  only  a miracle  that  the  white  man 
is  not  shooting  and  burning  fifteen  or  twenty  thousand  black  men  a 
year  for  trying  to  reach  what  he  has  made  their  ideal  woman,  instead 
of  twelve  or  fifteen,  but  it  is  a greater  miracle  that  the  race  succeeds 
in  producing  a single  virtuous  woman,  while  it  has  thousands  to  its 
credit. 

(10)  In  watching  the  street-car  manners  in  our  metropolitan 
cities,  it  will  be  seen  that  all  people,  in  their  natural  state  of  freedom, 
with  their  ideals  in  their  own  particular  race  or  tribe,  upon  entering 
a car  are  involuntarily  drawn  toward  members  of  their  own  race,  and 
will  be  seated  beside  them  if  possible,  while  the  Afro-American,  the 
single  exception,  in  three  cases  out  of  four,  will  rush  by  a member  of 
his  race  to  find  a seat  bv  a white  man  or  woman,  or,  failing  in  that,  a 
member  of  any  other  race,  rather  than  his  own. 

Seeing  him  run  from  himself,  all  other  people  are  rightly  run- 
ning from  him.  But  he  is  keeping  so  closely  upon  the  heels  of  ths 
white  man.  his  ideal,  who  is  tired  of  running,  that  he  has  decided  to 
stop  him  with  “Jim  Crow”  legislation  and  partition  walls. 

Actions,  impelled  by  the  diseased  spirit,  which  is  responsible  for 
all  these  symptoms,  have  resulted  in  making  the  Afro-American  a 
pauper,  criminal,  outcast,  and  laughing-stock,  in  destroying  his  in- 
fluence, ballot,  and  citizenship,  in  depriving  him  of  all  employment  in 
the  economic  world  above  that  of  menials  and  scavengers,  and  in 


14 


RACE  IDEALS. 


cheapening  his  personality  and  life;  as  it  is  with  an  individual  so  it 
is  with  a race — the  poorer  he  is  the  less  is  cared  for  his  rights,  or 
life,  whether  he  be  black  or  white. 

A LEGEND. 

“A  proud  Southern  white  man  was  once  aroused  from  his  vigils 
to  find  himself  transformed  into  the  physical  likeness  of  a black  man. 

“’When  social  and  economic  organism  assigned  his  physical  body 
to  the  rank  and  condition  of  Afro-Americans,  his  spiritual  man,  in 
control  of  the  black  physical  body,  rebelled  against  such  assignment, 
and  haughtily  commanded  the  body  to  consider  itself  a part  and  parcel 
of  the  rights  and  privileges  reserved  for  white  men  only,  regardless 
of  consequences. 

“Confusion  and  turmoil  ensued,  with  a growing  feeling  of  resent- 
ment and  hatred  on  the  part  of  the  white  spiritual  man,  and  an  in- 
creasing feeling  of  humiliation,  hatred,  and  helplessness  on  the  part 
of  the  black  physical  body. 

“The  white  spiritual  man,  charging  up  all  his  misfortunes  to  the 
black  physical  body,  of  which  he  could  not  relieve  himself  in  life,  com- 
manded it  to  change  its  physical  likeness  in  conformity  with  his  ideals 
and  wishes,  and  upon  its  failure  to  comply,  strangled  it  to  death,  or 
committed  suicide.” 

The  Afro-American,  in  many  respects,  is  just  such  a creature. 


Part  II. 


THE  CAUSE. 

The  foregoing  dispositions,  and  actions  growing  out  of  them,  are 
the  symptoms  and  effects  of  the  Afro-American’s  unusual  disease, 
which  show  that  some  powerful  and  destructive  foreign  influence  has 
wrought  havoc  with  Nature’s  law,  or  his  spiritual  being. 

The  predispositions  impelling  such  actions  show  that  an  un- 
natural spirit,  the  very  fountain  of  all  thought  and  actions,  despising 
its  own  physical  body,  has  been  developed  in  Afro-Americans,  which 
seriously  interferes  with  the  maintenance,  happiness,  and  existence  of 
his  body. 

The  work  of  developing  such  a spirit,  begun  in  the  cradle,  was 
continued  in  the  home,  and  finished  in  the  school,  and  resulted  in  pro- 
ducing a paradoxical  being,  which  is  not  only  ashamed  of  itself,  and 
is  using  its  powers  against  itself,  but  despises  the  race  with  which 
Nature  has  bound  it  up. 

Such  are  the  symptoms  and  effects  of  the  peculiar  disease  of  the 
Afro-American  race,  which  we  must  now  proceed  to  trace  to  their 
cause,  and  learn  the  manner  in  which  such  a soul-destroying  disease 
was  developed,  and  so  uncover  it,  that  those  who  have  to  do  with  cur- 
ing it,  may,  seeing  where  and  how  it  begun,  know  how  to  begin  their 
work  of  relief. 

When  through  his  ancestry  the  Afro-American  was  violently 
seized  and  brought  in  contact  with  the  white  man,  like  him  and  other 
men  in  a natural  state  of  freedom,  his  ideal  man,  his  highest  concep- 
tion of  man,  was  in  himself. 

As  long  as  such  was  the  case,  he  was  not  only  too  proud  and  self- 
respecting  to  be  a slave,  but  considered  himself  better  than  the  white 
man. 

In  consequence  of  which  it  cost  too  much  in  care,  treasure,  and 
blood  to  retain  him  in  a state  of  slavery  ,and  it  was  found  necessary 
to  reduce  his  spiritual  state,  his  pride  and  self-respect  to  the  low  level 
in  which  they  are  now  seen. 

In  order  to  do  this,  not  only  the  victim’s  ancestral  and  tradi- 
tional plan  of  life  was  changed  so  as  to  destroy  the  class,  which  pro- 
duces the  ideals,  standards,  and  models  of  every  race,  the  generators 

15 


16 


RACE  IDEALS. 


of  race,  family,  and  individual  pride;  but  every  victim,  of  whatever 
ancestral  grade,  was  reduced  to  the  same  level  of  life,  and  there  was 
not  a single  star  of  hope,  or  any  inspiration,  left  in  his  racial 
firmament. 

Whether  descended  from  long  lines  of  peasants,  priests,  warriors, 
or  kings,  all  the  victims  were  crowded  together  in  the  same  low  and 
degrading  quarters,  in  huts  constructed  on  one  general  plan  out  of  the 
same  material,  where  they  were  fed,  shod,  clothed,  rewarded,  or  pun- 
ished alike,  and  trained  to  feel  that  all  people  bearing  their  hue  were 
equals,  but  inferior  to  all  who  possessed  a white  face. 

The  effect  of  this  training  is  still  seen  in  the  Afro-American’s 
disposition  not  to  serve  members  of  his  own  race,  and  to  oppose  their 
elevation  to  positions  above  him. 

The  conditions,  ideals,  and  standards  which  developed  a spirit  m 
the  white  master  to  appreciate  and  admire  the  superior  condition  of 
his  race,  and  to  honor  his  own  color  as  a badge  of  that  condition,  and 
to  contemn  and  depreciate  the  inferior  condition  of  the  black  slave, 
and  despise  his  dark  hue  as  a badge  of  a low  condition,  developed  sim- 
ilar feelings  in  the  black  slave. 

There  is  scarcely  a white  man  in  this  country*  even  including 
Tillman,  Vardaman,  and  Dixon,  who  appreciates  and  honors  the  color 
of  the  white  man  on  the  one  hand,  and  despises  the  color  of  the  black 
man  on  the  other,  more  than  the  Afro-American  himself. 

Say  what  he  may,  deny  the  fact  as  often  as  he  pleases,  his  whole 
action  betra}7s  the  fact  that  he  is  unconsciously  as  wild  over  trying  to 
be  white  as  Tillman  is  over  being  white,  and  he  should  no'  be  held 
responsible  for  such  feelings  either. 

Eut  when  their  cause  and  effect  are  made  plain  to  him,  as  we 
are  endeavoring  to  do,  he  should  always  carefully  study  himself,  and 
seek  to  destroy  every  symptom  of  such  feelings  as  he  would  a rattle- 
snake, especially  when  he  remembers  that  the  spirit  which  impels 
them  had  its  inception  and  development  in  the  institution  of  slavery, 
is  still  the  spirit  of  a slave,  and  will  always  make  the  physical  man 
do  slavish  service,  until  it  is  utterly  destroyed. 

While  the  institution  of  slavery  put  all  of  its  dark-hued  victims 
in  the  same  condition  and  trained  them  to  feel  that  they  were  equals, 
it  placed  all  members  of  the  master  class,  or  white  race,  in  positions 
far  above  the  slave  class,  and  so  graded  them  round  upon  round,  from 
peasant  to  president,  that  each  grade  above  remained  a perpetual  door 
of  hope  and  inspiration  to  every  white  man  in  the  one  below  it. 

In  that  way  the  ideals,  models,  standards,  and  idols,  the  gener- 
ators of  pride  and  inspiration  of  the  white  race,  were  and  are  main- 


THE  CAUSE. 


17 


tained,  with  not  only  all  power  and  authority  reserved  to  members  of 
that  race,  but  they  were  and  are  still  the  beneficiaries  of  all  the  prof- 
its resulting  from  the  production  and  consumption  of  both  races. 

In  the  immediate  presence  of  the  black  man,  in  his  state  of  pov- 
erty, ignorance,  degradation,  and  humiliation,  the  whites,  or  master 
class,  were  so  trained,  polished,  and  beautified  with  the  products  of  his 
labor  in  which  he  was  left  so  poor  and  undeveloped  that  the  wealth, 
power,  honor,  and  magnificence  associated  with  the  color  of  the  white 
man  on  the  one  hand,  contrasted  with  the  poverty,  ignorance,  helpless- 
ness, and  degradation  associated  with  the  color  of  the  black  man  on  the 
other,  developed  in  the  minds  of  the  members  of  both  races  inordinate 
respect  and  admiration  for  the  color  made  a badge  of  honor  by  its  asso- 
ciation with  the  higher  condition,  and  a corresponding  depreciation 
and  contempt  for  the  color  made  a badge  of  dishonor  by  its  association 
with  the  lower  condition. 

The  established  condition,  and  feelings  growing  out  of  it,  are  still 
being  transmitted  from  generation  to  generation  by  ! oth  races,  and 
will  continue  until  they  are  changed.  The  truth  is,  the  work  of  chang- 
ing former  conditions  is  made  doubly  hard  because  the  spirit  of  both 
races  is  opposed  to  it. 

To  satisfy  a spirit  made  to  maintain  the  old  condition  not  only 
has  the  white  man  refused  to  pay  black  men  living  wages,  denied  them 
employment  above  menials  and  scavengers,  destroyed  their  property, 
and  opposed  their  enjoyment  of  the  honors  and  emoluments  of  office, 
but  the  black  man  himself,  for  the  same  reason,  has  refused  to  serve 
members  of  his  race,  destroyed  their  live  stock,  burnt  their  houses, 
bams,  and  business  places,  and  denied  them  his  patronage.  This 
shows  that  the  institution  of  slavery  developed  a spirit  in  both  races 
to  support  and  oppose  the  same  things. 

Under  such  conditions  and  training,  the  black  man  finally  lost 
pride  in  himself,  developed  a contempt  for  his  race  and  color,  and 
grew  to  feel  that  it  was  honorable  to  serve  a white  man,  but  an  un- 
thinkable disgrace  to  serve  a member  of  his  own  race. 

Throughout  the  industrial  world,  where  he  is  making  millions 
of  white  people  rich  from  the  profits  on  his  labor,  it  is  seen  that  he  is 
still  impelled  by  such  feelings  to  discriminate  against  members  of  his 
own  race  with  his  labor,  and  has  thereby  prevented  them  from  becom- 
ing the  industrial  captains  of  their  communities. 

The  Afro-American  was  formerly  trained  to  carry  everything 
made  on  the  plantation  to  “the  big  house”  or  master’s  quarters,  and 
have  doled  out  to  him  only  sufficient  to  keep  his  soul  and  body  to- 


18 


RACE  IDEALS. 


gether  to  enable  him  to  produce  more,  and  the  poverty  of  his  com- 
munity, when  compared  with  that  of  his  white  neighbor,  whether  in 
country,  town,  or  city,  shows  that  he  is  still  governed  by  the  same 
training,  and  is  still  carrying  the  results  of  his  labor  to  “the  big  house” 
or  white  man’s  quarters. 

Visit  any  white  man’s  business  place  in  his  community,  however 
mean  or  prejudiced  he  may  be,  even  if  he  makes  it  a pastime  to 
kill  a “nigger”  once  or  twice  a year,  and  there  you  will  find  the  black 
men,  as  thick  as  flies  on  a foul  spot,  or  bees  on  a honeysuckle. 

The  Afro-American  is  everywhere  still  carrying  his  productions 
to  the  master  class  or  white  race,  and  his  former  training  has  him 
under  such  a spell  still  that  he  discriminates  with  his  labor  and  in- 
fluence in  favor  of  any  member  of  the  white  race  as  against  any  mem- 
ber of  his  own  race,  however  good  or  bad  either  may  be;  this  is  caus- 
ing him  to  maintain  the  old  condition  of  poverty  and  dependence  for 
all  members  of  his  race,  and  independence  and  honor  for  all  members 
of  the  white  race,  which  continues  to  breed  contempt  for  his  color  and 
make  it  a badge  of  dishonor  in  this  country. 

After  three  generations  of  the  environment  and  brutal  training, 
which  the  ancestry  of  the  Afro-American  race  passed  through,  the 
spirit  of  the  victims  was  broken,  pride  of  race  and  self-respect  were  de- 
stroyed, and  they  finally  came  to  place  the  same  value  on  the  members 
of  their  race  as  the  master  class  did,  since  w'hich  time  they  were  both 
spiritual  and  physical  slaves  down  to  the  issuance  of  the  Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation,  and  are  still  spiritual  slaves. 

Under  such  conditions,  as  the  master  class,  or  white  race,  im- 
proved, physically,  mentally,  and  spiritually,  in  the  same  proportion 
he  was  degraded  in  the  same  respects;  and  as  no  member  of  his  race 
occupied  such  a position  that  he  could  give  hope  and  inspiration  to 
his  felhws,  in  time  his  polished  man,  his  man  of  power,  wisdom, 
beauty,  and  admiration,  his  model  man — in  short,  his  ideal  man,  was 
found  only  among  members  of  the  white  race,  and  the  black  slave,  im- 
pelled by  such  means,  transferred  his  ideal  man  to  the  white  race, 
since  which  time  he  has  even  been  dissatisfied  with  his  own  physical 
likeness. 

The  ideals  of  his  descendants  are  still  in  the  white  race,  and  they 
are  still  looking  up  to  that  race,  and  will  continue  until  changed  con- 
ditions retransfer  their  human  ideals  to  themselves. 

The  spirit,  which  predisposes  his  descendants  to  feel  that  it  is  a 
disgrace  to  serve  each  other,  was  incubated,  nursed,  and  developed  in 
a slavish  condition,  and  will  have  to  be  changed  by  reason  and  train- 
ing before  the  race  can  ever  hope  to  be  prosperous  and  successful. 


THE  CAUSE. 


19 


The  feelings,  customs,  and  habits  disposing  Afro-Americans  to 
discriminate  with  their  labor,  patronage,  and  influence  against  them- 
selves  were  developed  by  the  art  of  the  master  class,  and  are  not  the 
work  of  Nature,  whose  laws  are  ruthlessly  broken  in  every  one  of  them. 

The  spirit  impelling  such  feelings  and  habits  must  continue  to 
make  their  world  a heaven  for  the  white  man  and  his  descendants, 
and  a hell  of  menials,  scavengers,  paupers,  and  criminals  for  the  Afro- 
American  and  his  descendants,  until  he  is  wise  enough  to  look  within 
himself  for  the  cause,  and  wipe  out  existing  conditions  by  changing  the 
spirit  which  makes  them  possible. 

THE  EFFECT  OF  THE  TRANSFERENCE  OF  IDEALS. 

The  transference  of  the  human  ideals  of  the  Afro-American  race 
resulted  in  the  spiritual  degradation  of  its  members,  and  their  off- 
spring, and  places  them  in  a class  by  themselves,  when  compared  with 
other  branches  of  the  Ethiopian  race. 

All  Afro-Americans  should  get  busy  and  find  a way  to  restore 
lost  ideals. 

The  white  spiritual  man,  which  controls  the  black  physical  bodies 
of  the  Afro-American  race,  was  developed  by  feeding  him  for  three 
hundred  years  exclusively  with  white  models,  standards,  paintings, 
pictures,  ideals,  and  if  it  is  desired  to  reverse  his  disposition,  the  spir- 
itual food  must  in  some  respects  be  changed.  Those  who  plan  sys- 
tems for  training  Afro-Americans,  and  are  engaged  in  training  them, 
must  realize,  before  they  can  ever  secure  proper  results,  that  every 
habit,  custom,  manner,  and  tradition  bv  which  they  are  controlled  was 
developed  in  them  to  make  a slave. 

?uch  habits,  customs,  and  manners  are  fundamental,  as  they  con- 
stitute the  base  of  all  conventional  plans  of  education,  which  they 
surpersede  in  influence,  and  must  continue  to  reproduce  the  old  con- 
dition of  master  and  slave  until  a ylan,  or  system,  of  training  is  spe- 
cially designed  to  rid  the  race  of  them.  As  the  white  man  is  not 
going  out  of  his  wav  to  develop  a system  of  training  which  his  race 
does  not  need,  this  greatly  needed  work  must  remain  to  be  planned 
and  initiated  by  the  people  who  are  perishing  for  the  want  of  it. 

COLOR  USED  AS  A SCREEN  TO  HIDE  DEFECTS. 

The  color  of  the  Afro-American  has  been,  and  is  still,  used  as  a 
screen  to  hide  the  objectionable  traits  and  characteristics,  which  are 
so  repugnant  to  those  who  do  not  possess  them ; customs,  habits,  and 
manners,  which  are  not  only  objectionable  to  white  people,  but  even 


20 


RACE  IDEALS. 


all  black  people  who  are  in  a state  of  both  physical  and  spiritual 
freedom. 

If  the  Afro-American  had  not  been  trained  to  feel  and  believe 
that  the  objections  and  discriminations,  which  he  meets,  are  all  on 
account  of  color,  he  would  have  long  since  seen  and  removed  most 
of  their  causes. 

But,  for  want  of  proper  consideration,  his  leadership  has  been 
harmonious  in  perpetuating  the  color  screen  by  denouncing,  in  and  out 
of  season,  all  discrimination  and  disbarment  as  being  solely  on  ac- 
count of  color,  by  which  means,  the  things  of  which  the  color  is  merely 
a badge,  have  been  hidden. 

The  Far-Reaching  Power  and  Control  of  the  Spirit  of  Slavery. 

The  want  of  success  in  Afro-Americans  is  neither  for  want  of 
capacity  nor  capital,  but  it  is  caused  by  the  self-destructive  spirit  and 
hostile  habits  and  customs  of  slavery,  which  are  still  above  all,  under 
all,  and  in  all  that  they  attempt  to  do. 

They  have  more  learning  running  to  waste  in  hotel  waiters  and 
Pullman  car  porters  than  is  necessary  to  man  all  the  business  that 
thev  can  support,  enough  capital  to  lay  the  foundation  of  business, 
f that  would  soon  make  them  a strong  and  independent  people,)  lying 
idle  in  the  banks  of  the  country  or  being  used  where  they  realize  very 
small  benefits. 

It  is  neither  capital,  nor  want  of  learning,  nor  prepared  men  and 
women,  that  is  holding  Afro-Americans  back  in  the  business  world. 
It  is  the  spell  of  the  old  spirit  of  slavery,  which  has  made  their  present 
condition;  the  want  of  confidence  in  their  own  people;  the  fear  of  the 
spell  which  they  know  their  white  competitors  have  over  their  people, 
and  the  race  prejudice,  which  would  prevent  their  white  neighbors 
from  patronizing  them. 

There  still  are,  and  have  been  tens  and  hundreds  of  thousands 
of,  Afro-Americans  with  the  genius  and  capacity  to  make  great  and 
successful  industrial  captains,  thereby  becoming  a part  of  the  controll- 
ing power  of  their  communities,  who  remain  mediocres  or  servants  in 
the  employment  of  the  white  master,  because  the  very  members  of  their 
own  race,  who  would  flock  for  employment  to  the  plantations  of  the 
white  owners,  whom  they  are  making  wealthy  by  their  service  as  driver, 
overseer,  or  superintendent,  would  absolutely  refuse  to  serve,  or  be 
employed  by  them,  if  it  were  known  that  they  owned  the  plantation,  or 
industry. 

There  are  tens  and  hundreds  of  thousands  of  instances,  where  the 
white  owner  of  a plantation,  or  industry,  has  to  employ  a white  man 


THE  CAUSE. 


21 


of  inferior  capacity  to  superintend,  or  conduct,  his  business  enterprise, 
through  colored  overseers,  or  drivers,  with  superior  capacity,  because 
his  colored  employees  demand  such,  and  will  render  more  profitable 
service  under  such  conditions,  notwithstanding  their  wages  must  be 
proportionately  reduced  to  make  up  the  large  salary  usually  paid  for 
such  service. 

The  spirit  running  through,  and  governing,  all  such  transactions 
is  the  same  that  demands  approaches  to  the  white  model,  or  idol,  in 
the  complexion  of  the  teachers  and  preachers  in  Afro-American  schools 
and  churches;  where  the  white  man  is  not  a part  of  the  institution  and 
will  not  condescend  to  teach  or  preach,  which  is  true  whether  the  in- 
tellectual man  of  the  race  is  developed,  or  undeveloped. 

In  fact,  in  many  instances  the  intellectually  developed  man, 
under  the  control  of  such  a wickedly  slavish  spirit,  becomes  a greater 
engine  of  destruction.  A scientific  analysis  will  prove  that  the  spirit 
which  causes  the  Afro-American  to  keep  his  race  poor  and  in  a low 
condition,  by  refusing  to  leave  the  profits  of  his  labor  and  patronage 
with  its  members,  is  the  same  spirit  that  moves  the  Tillmans  and 
Vardanians  to  make  strenuous  efforts  to  keep  the  race  poor  and  help- 
less, as  a means  of  continuing  old  conditions,  by  denying  its  members 
education,  living  wages,  or  official  position,  through  which  the  means 
may  be  acquired  to  change  conditions. 

It  is  such  a union  of  the  old  slave  spirit  of  the  two  raqes  in  this 
country,  in  their  different  relations,  that  is  maintaining  the  old  slave 
conditions  for  the  respective  races,  in  which  service  that  spirit  is  caus- 
ing tht  black  man  to  do  equally  as  much  to  keep  himself  down  in  his 
sphere,  as  the  white  man  is  doing  in  his. 

In  fact,  it  is  this  spirit  in  the  Afro-American  that  has  made  a 
Tillman,  or  a Vardaman,  possible.  If  such  a spirit  d;d  not  impel  the 
Afro-American  to  discriminate  against  himself  with  his  labor  and  pat- 
ronage in  States  like  South  Carolina  and  Mississippi,  where  he  con- 
tributes the  vast  majority  of  the  population,  and  constitutes  almost 
the  so'e  producing  class,  those  States  would  be  the  last  places  in  the 
world  to  produce  Tillmans  and  Vardanians. 

He  must,  in  some  way,  be  aroused  from  his  long  night  of  slumber 
to  race  consciousness;  and  made  conscious  of  his  defects  as  well  as 
of  his  powers,  with  a view  to  having  him  rid  himself  of  the  former 
and  properly  use  the  latter. 

As  evidence  that  it  is  the  same  in  both  races  in  this  country,  this 
slavish  spirit,  which  T am  exposing  with  a view  to  aiding  my  race, 
will,  because  of  such  exposure,  dictate  my  destruction  to  very  nearly  as 

msnv  black  as  white  men. 


RACE  IDEALS. 


The  Afro-American  must  not  only  turn  his  search-light  on  other 
members  of  his  race,  with  a view  to  running  down  and  driving  out  the 
monster  which  is  proving  the  greatest  enemy  of  his  race,  but  should 
turn  the  same  search-light  within  himself,  and  he  will  be  surprised  to 
find  the  same  destructive  ruler  seated  on  a throne  within  his  own 
bosom ; and  will  have  to  get  so  busy  in  efforts  to  drive  him  from  his 
own  bosom  that  he  would  hardly  find  time  to  help  his  fellows. 

The  spirit  in  a Tillman  or  a Yardaman,  which  dictates  that  only 
white  men  shall  enjoy  the  honors  and  emoluments  of  office,  is  the 
same  in  the  Afro-American  that  dictates  approaches  to  the  hue  of  the 
white  man  in  his  teachers,  preachers,  and  leaders. 

DESTRUCTIVE  INCONSISTENCIES  OF  EDUCATED  AFRO- 
AMERICANS. 

The  blinding  economic  ignorance  of  the  Afro-American  minister, 
doctor,  lawyer,  teacher,  and  other  professional  and  business  classes, 
whollv  dependent  upon  the  race  for  support,  which  causes  them  to 
spend  their  own  patronage  and  influence  with  the  communicants, 
clients,  patients,  etc.,  of  their  white  competitors,  while  loudly  com- 
plaining of  the  want  of  appreciation  and  patronage  commensurate 
with  the  numbers  of  their  own  race  in  their  communities,  is  to  be 
deplored.  Such  economic  ignorance  is  making  them  a class  of  helpless 
parasites. 

It  appears  that  they  have  not  yet  fully  realized  that  their  patron- 
age and  influence  are  always  making  better  prepared  supporters, 
whether  within  the  class  supporting  them  or  others,  and  that  if  they 
are  spent  with  others  instead  of  themselves,  the  action  makes  their 
supporters  less  able  to  give  or  pay,  and  themselves  correspondingly 
poorer. 

All  Afro-Americans,  of  whatever  class,  business,  or  profession, 
should  understand  that  the  separation  of  the  race,  in  such  a way  as 
to  make  different  professional  and  business  men  necessary  for  each 
race,  was  not  done  by  any  wish  or  act  of  theirs;  but,  since  it  is  forced 
on  the  race,  it  becomes  a matter  of  self-preservation,  and  not  prejudice, 
frr  its  members  to  use  all  their  patronage  and  influence  to  strengthen 
those  upon  whom  they  are  dependent  for  support,  and  whose  general 
condition  makes  up  the  average  condition  of  the  race,  and  is  there- 
fore their  condition. 

In  fact,  if  the  flowing  of  the  great  tidal  wave  of  currency,  the 
conductor  of  the  staff  of  life,  is  ever  to  be  partly  reverted  to  the  tills 
and  coffers  of  Afro-Americans,  and  anything  like  reciprocity  in  trade 
and  patronge  is  ever  established  between  the  races,  they  must  make 
the  sacrifice  necessary  to  build  a business  on  their  side  of  the  house 


THE  CAUSE. 


23 


of  such  dimensions  and  influence  as  to  draw  a part  of  the  trade  of 
their  white  neighbors. 

THE  HARM  DONE  BY  MAKING  THE  COLOR,  INSTEAD  OF  THE 
, DEFECTS,  THE  CAUSE. 

The  race  in  making  its  color  the  cause,  instead  of  its  badge,  is 
doing  itself  untold  harm,  not  only  by  using  it  as  a screen  to  hide  its 
defects,  the  real  cause  and  enemy,  but  in  destroying  all  hopes  for  it9 
members,  by  making  them  feel  that  the  discriminations  and  rebuffs 
met  are  owing  to  their  color,  the  badge,  which  they  cannot  change  if 
they  wish,  instead  of  the  defects  which  long  years  of  training  devel- 
oped, and  which  appear  natural  to  them  because,  they  are  born  and 
reared  in  them — the  real  cause,  which  they  can  and  will  change  or 
destroy  as  soon  as  they  are  made  to  appear  in  their  true  light  to  them, 
as  they  do  to  others. 

Such  impressions,  on  the  one  hand,  make  members  of  the  race 
feel  that  since  they  are  discriminated  against  and  rejected  solely  on 
account  of  color,  a natural  cause,  which  they  cannot  change,  they  are 
doomed  to  everlasting  misery,  which  is  greatly  discouraging  and  par- 
alyzing their  energies ; while,  on  the  other  hand,  the  regarding  of  such 
objectionable  defects  as  natural  and  ineradicable  characteristics  and 
traits  of  the  race  is  a false  and  ver/  damaging  conclusion,  which  is 
not  only  obscuring  the  real  good  that  friends  might  do  in  aiding  the 
race  to  get  rid  of  such  defects,  but  is  making  room  for  the  Tillmans, 
Yardamans,  and  Dixons,  the  wicked  and  malevolent  slanderers  and 
traducers  of  a race  in  its  weakness  and  helplessness,  as  the  founda- 
tion is  thereby  laid  upon  which  they  are  building  their  false  super- 
structure of  race  hatred,  because  they  are  regarding  such  founda- 
tion, developed  by  the  art  of  man,  as  being  the  work  of  Nature’s 
God. 

When  this  class  of  falsely  developed  and  superficial  philosophers 
approach  the  native  African  and  find  him  devoid  of  the  characteristics 
and  traits,  which  the  art  of  their  forefathers  developed  in  the  Afro- 
Amprican,  and  which  they  are  declaring  racial  and  ineradicable,  in 
support  of  the  false  conclusions,  which  are  upset  by  the  discovery, 
thev  immediately  proceed  to  separate  the  latter  from  the  Ethiopian 
race  and  the  Adamic  creation. 

Years  Spent  in  Search  of  Proof  to  Sustain  False  Conclusions. 

That  class  of  men  has  vainly  spent  years  in  anatomical  and 
physiological  research  to  find  one  atom  of  matter  more  or  less  in  black 
men  than  in  white  men,  to  support  its  false  conclusion?  and  preju- 


24 


RACE  IDEALS. 


dices,  but  its  pusillanimous  labors  resulted  in  nothing  higher  nor 
holier  than  the  coining  of  the  contemptible  epithet  “Negro”  to  desig- 
nate and  separate  the  being,  whom,  it  failed  to  find  a natural  cause, 
to  make  less  than  man. 

The  word  “Negro”  as  a race  designation  is  both  unscientific  and 
inapplicable,  and  its  acceptation  as  such  is  the  most  foolish  and  ridic- 
ulous thing  that  the  Afro-American  has  ever  done;  and  the  only  reason 
that  can  be  advanced  for  such  a degrading  acceptation  is  that  slavish 
training  has  made  him  ashamed  of  Afro-American,  his  ancestral  name. 

With  the  descendants  of  every  tribe  of  this  intertribal  nation 
exulting  in  the  pride  of  perpetuating  their  ancestral  name,  by  having 
it  compounded  with  that  of  their  adopted  country,  such  as  Irish- 
American,  German-American,  Swedish-American,  etc.,  etc.,  the  Afro- 
American  stands  alone  in  his  disposition  to  discard  and  reject  the  per- 
petuation of  his  ancestral  name  in  the  manner  as  the  others  do. 

The  Effect  of  the  Emancipation  Proclamation. 

While  the  Emancipation  Proclamation  destroyed  legal  physical 
slavery,  it  did  not  change  a single  habit,  custom,  nor  manner,  nor  the 
snirit,  which  long  years  of  systematic  training  produced  to  make  a 
master  and  a slave,  and  which  will  in  effect  continue  until  the  result 
of  such  training  is  destroyed. 

It  only  destroyed  the  physical  power  which  prevented  the  freed- 
man  from  voluntarily  changing  a low  and  dishonorable  condition, 
which  will  be  his  as  long  as  he  retains  the  spirit  and  habits,  customs, 
and  manners  that  were  developed  in  him  to  produce  and  maintain  such 
a condition.  The  changing  of  such  a spirit  and  such  habits,  customs, 
and  manners  constitutes  the  real  problem  which  Afro-Americans  have 
to  solve. 

After  such  spirit  and  such  habits,  customs,  and  manners  were 
once  developed,  and  the  environment  made  and  atmosphere  produced 
in  which  they  are  incubated,  they  became  traditional,  as  the  offspring, 
born  and  reared  in  any  condition,  in  the  absence  of  countervailing  in- 
fluences must  necessarily  acquire  the  spirit,  habits,  manners,  and  cus- 
toms to  which  it  is  subjected  and  accustomed. 

The  countervailing  influence  necessary  to  overcome  the  effect  of 
years  of  bad  training,  is  not  even  yet  conceived,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
development  of  a system  of  training,  to  rid  the  race  of  habits  and  cus- 
toms engendered  to  make  slaves,  and  needed  to  make  it  spiritually  free. 

What  renders  the  problem  doubly  delicate  and  serious  is  that  the 
effort  to  solve  it  is  not  only  hostile  to  the  welfare  of  the  beneficiaries 


THE  CAUSE. 


25 


of  such  habits,  customs,  and  manners,  but  is  unwelcome  to  the  dis- 
torted spirit  of  the  victims,  the  Afro-Americans  themselves. 

Thus  it  is  seen  that  the  real  cause  of  the  disease  of  Afro-Amer- 
icans is  not  only  the  habits,  customs,  and  manners  which  centuries  of 
training  produced  to  make  a slave,  but  what  is  far,  far  more  damning 
and  hard  to  reach  is  the  dwarfed  and  cowardly  white  spirit  which  has 
been  developed  in  their  bodies,  and  is  still  forcing  them  to  serve  its 
ideal  physically  white  man. 

That  spirit  must  be  changed,  before  the  low  and  degrading  con- 
dition, which  has  made  the  color  of  the  race  a badge  of  dishonor,  can 
be  changed. 

If  the  spiritual  man,  the  master,  the  ruler  of  the  trinity  of  the 
composite  man  of  the  Afro-American,  can  be  made  to  assume  a friend- 
lv  disposition  toward  the  physical  man  in  which  it  dwells,  and  to 
legard  it  with  as  much  admiration  as  it  does  the  physical  man  of  the 
composite  body  of  the  white  man,  a wonderful  change  in  the  better- 
ment of  the  economic  condition  of  the  race  will  immediately  follow, 
and  following  improved  economic  conditions,  the  public  opinion  of 
the  world  will  grow  more  and  more  favorable  toward  Afro-Americans. 

HOW  THE  DIFFERENCE  BETWEEN  CHRISTIANITY  AS  PRACTICED 
AND  MOHAMMEDANISM  AFFECTED  DR.  E.  W.  BLYDEN. 

It  was  the  apparent  difference  in  the  spiritual  effect  of  Christian- 
ity as  practiced  by  the  white  man,  and  Mohammedanism  as  practiced 
hv  Mohammedans,  upon  the  natives  of  Africa,  that  caused  Dr.  Ed- 
ward B.  Blyden,  one  of  the  most  learned  men  living,  to  change  from 
Christianity,  in  which  he  was  born,  reared,  and  ordained  a minister, 
to  Mohammedanism. 

When  he  compared  the  spiritual  results  of  the  two  religions,  their 
effects  of  making  men  or  less  than  men,  Christianity  on  the  sea  coast, 
or  wherever  it  had  planted  itself  among  the  natives  of  Africa,  and 
Mohammedanism  in  the  interior,  and  discovered  that  wherever  the 
former  existed  the  natives  were  demoralized,  brutalized,  and  made 
spiritual  wrecks,  less  than  men,  and  wherever  the  latter  existed  the 
natives  were  just  as  proud,  independent,  and  self-respecting  as  any 
other  members  of  their  religious  faith,  because  the  latter  religion  does 
not  know  nor  tolerate  any  difference  among  its  adherents  on  account 
of  race  or  color,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  choose  Mohammedanism  as  the 
better  religion  for  him  and  his  race. 

When  the  white  man  sees  the  difference,  as  brought  out  in  the 
native,  between  the  product  of  his  religion  as  practiced  and  Moham- 
medanism as  practiced,  he  proceeds  to  separate  the  members  of  the 
same  race,  as  being  of  different  orders  of  creation,  designating  the 


2t 


RACE  IDEALS. 


superior  product  that  Islamism  is  producing  as  being  the  real  descend- 
ants of  Ethiopia,  and  placing  the  inferior  product  of  his  religion  as 
practiced  outside  of  the  Adamic  creation. 

The  Standards  of  Living  of  Afro-Americans  Are  Still  Another  Cause  of 

Low  Conditions. 

It  is  a notorious,  but  regrettable  fact,  that  the  standard  of  living 
for  Afro-Americans,  is  higher  than  that  of  any  other  class  of  Ameri- 
cans in  a similar  economic  condition. 

They  use  a higher  grade,  as  a general  thing,  than  any  other  class 
in  their  condition,  which  necessarily  makes  it  harder  for  them  to  ac- 
cumulate sufficient  capital  to  commence  the  purchase  of  a home,  or 
to  start  a little  business  enterprise,  than  others  receiving  the  same 
standard  of  wages,  but  putting  less  into  food  and  clothing. 

The  question  very  naturally  arises  as  to  why  the  Afro-American’s 
standards  of  living  are  higher  than  others  in  his  economic  condition, 
and  very  often  so  very  far  beyond  his  means. 

The  answer  is  that  the  master  class,  and  not  the  poor  white  man, 
was  made  his  ideal,  model,  and  standard  of  life. 

He  was  trained  to  look  down  upon  the  poor  white  trash  with  near- 
ly as  great  contempt,  as  he  does  members  of  his  own  race,  and  to  see 
nothing  in  or  about  them  worthy  of  his  imitation. 

In  making  the  better-conditioned  class  of  white  people  his  ideals, 
models,  and  standards,  the  Afro-American  has  erroneously  substituted 
effects  for  causes,  shadows  for  substances. 

Because  the  wealthy  and  professional  classes  of  white  people  usu- 
ally dress  in  keeping  with  their  means  and  standing,  making  the  dresa 
merely  £>  badge  of  the  condition  or  class,  which  causes  the  apprecia- 
tion of  the  personality  of  the  wearers,  in  his  superficial  reasoning,  the 
Afro-American  is  led  to  the  very  harmful  conclusion  that  the  dress, 
the  shadow,  the  mere  badge,  instead  of  the  substance,  the  wealth,  the 
class,  creates  the  respectability  of  the  wearer. 

Hence,  as  the  wealthy  or  so-called  aristocratic  classes  of  the  land 
are  usually  the  well-dressed  classes,  the  Afro-American  has  concluded 
that  the  dress  makes  the  aristocrat,  instead  of  being  merely  his  badge ; 
having  not  realized  that  one  wearing  the  badge  without  the  substance 
and  quality  is  sailing  under  false  colors,  is  a fraud,  he  is  making  him- 
self ridiculous,  keeping  himself  poor,  and  usually  incurring  the  con- 
tempt and  hostility  of  all  except  members  of  his  peculiar  class,  in  the 
foolish  sacrifices  made  to  wear  the  badge,  the  shadow  of  the  aristocrat. 

The  class  chosen  as  a standard  by  him  makes  money,  substance, 
find  brain  its  standard  of  aristocracy,  and  dress  merely  its  badge  or 


THE  CAUSE. 


27 


insignia,  and  in  imitating  the  class  in  dress  without  its  substance,  he 
places  himself  in  the  ridiculous  position  of  attempting  to  make  the 
badge  the  aristocrat,  the  shadow  the  substance. 

In  thus  aping,  or  imitating  aristocracy,  the  Afro-American  is  fool- 
ishly wasting  the  means,  which  might  in  time  develop  the  substance 
that  makes  the  aristocrat,  whom  he  is  serving  and  trying  to  imitate, 
and  who  has  gotten  tired  of  nis  attempted  imitations  and  is  endeavor- 
ing tc  destroy  the  possibility  of  such  by  reducing  his  wages  to  such  a 
standard  as  will  make  such  imitation  impossible. 

If,  during  the  past  thirty  years,  the  Afro-American  railway  port- 
ers and  hotel  waiters  had  not  been  spending  their  earnings  and  tips 
for  the  badges  and  shadows  of  aristocracy,  the  race  to-day  would  be 
able  to  boast  of  a class  of  real  aristocrats  based  upon  the  white  man’s 
standards,  and  the  wages  of  such  employees  would  have  appreciated 
with  those  of  all  employees  along  other  lines,  and  would  never  have 
been  reduced  to  their  present  low  standard. 

If  the  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars  which  Afro-Americans  have 
invested  in  the  badges,  or  shadows,  of  aristocracy  since  Emancipation, 
bad  been  invested  in  the  substance,  which  makes  aristocrats,  the  race 
would  have  many  hundred  times  more  property  and  business,  would 
be  employing  several  hundred  per  cent  more  of  its  own  members, 
would  be  in  full  possession  of  American  citizenship,  and  would  have 
a powerful  class  of  real  aristocrats,  which  it  could  use  to  break  down 
barriers  set  up  against  its  members. 


Pabt  III. 


THE  REMEDY. 

Before  the  remedy  for  the  disease  of  the  Afro-American,  who  is 
evidently  a weak,  sick,  abnormal  man,  can  be  intelligently,  or  scien- 
tifically, applied,  the  real  seat  of  his  disease  must  be  located,  and  the 
nature  of  its  cause  thoroughly  understood. 

Therefore,  in  order  to  obtain  concrete  and  precise  knowledge  of 
the  peculiar  malady  making  Afro-Americans,  the  finished  product  of 
the  American  institution  of  slavery,  less  than  other  men,  his  composite 
man  must  be  separated  into  the  three  elemental  men — the  acting  man, 
the  devising  man,  and  the  ruling,  or  commanding,  man. 

In  such  separation,  it  is  seen  that  composite  man  is  a trinity, 
consisting  of  the  mechanical  man,  the  intellectual  man,  and  the  spir- 
itual man,  either  one  of  which  may  be  abnormally  developed  at  the 
cost  of  the  other  two,  and  the  kind  of  service  that  composite  man  ren- 
ders, or  what  he  is,  depends  mainly  upon  how  his  spiritual  man  is 
developed. 

Let  us  now  proceed  to  analyze  and  examine,  with  a view  to  estab- 
lishing the  state  of  health,  and  the  real  value,  of  each  elemental  man 
of  his  composite  body,  not  only  with  a view  to  ascertaining  within 
which  one  of  the  three  his  disease  is  located,  but  with  the  further  ob- 
ject of  showing  that  if  the  spiritual  man,  the  master  man,  is-  sick  or 
weak,  no  matter  how  highly  the  other  two,  the  mechanical  and  intel- 
lectual men,  are  developed,  we  have  less  than  a man  in  his  composite 
body. 

THE  MECHANICAL  MAN. 

We  shall  first  take  the  mechanical,  acting,  or  doing,  man  of  the 
Afro-American's  composite  man  under  consideration,  and  endeavor  to 
establish,  by  comparisons  with  the  mechanical  man  of  a white  com- 
posite body,  whether  the  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  of  harsh  dis- 
cipline and  influences  have  made  the  former  equal  to,  less,  or  greater 
than  the  latter,  whether  he  was  strengthened,  or  weakened,  by  the 
ordeal. 

After  many  physical  endurance  and  pugilistic  tests  with  white 
men  and  other  races,  in  which  he  always  came  out  first  or  second  best, 
we  unhesitatingly  declare  that  his  two  and  a half  centuries  of  physical 

23 


THE  REMEDY 


29 


discipline  not  only  made  the  Afro-American  the  equal,  but  the  supe- 
rior physically  of  any  other  man  on  earth.  So  that  his  weakness  is  not 
in  his  mechanical  man,  which  is  powerful,  vigorous,  and  proves  him 
equal  to  any  emergency,  where  brawn  and  muscle  are  the  requirements. 

He  was  so  highly  developed  mechanically  that  he  not  only  pro- 
duced sufficient  for  his  own  and  his  master’s  support,  but  in  addition 
made  the  master,  the  wealthiest  and  most  princely,  class  of  American 
citizen.?. 

Therefore,  as  his  weakness,  or  disease,  is  not  to  be  found  in  his 
mechanical  man  no  more  attention  in  general,  if  as  much,  needs  be 
given  to  his  mechanical  man  than  that  of  the  mechanical  man  of  the 
white  composite  body,  and  when  the  proportion  of  his  mechanically 
trained  numbers  is  taken  into  consideration,  hardly  as  much. 

Therefore,  as  his  weakness,  or  disease,  is  not  to  be  found  in  his 
mechanical  man,  the  third  member  of  the  trinity,  we  will  proceed  with 
the  analysis  and  examination  of  his  intellectual  man,  the  second  mem- 
ber of  the  trinity. 

THE  INTELLECTUAL  MAN. 

In  all  contests  where  his  intellectual  man  has  been  put  on  trial  in 
anything  like  an  equal  chance,  with  the  intellectual  man  of  the  white 
composite  body,  he  came  out  first  or  second  best,  as  shown  in  his  com- 
petition, in  the  mixed  schools  of  the  Northern  States,  with  the  intel- 
lectual man  of  the  offspring  of  the  most  advanced  members  of  the 
white  race. 

Which  shows  that  his  period  of  adverse  training,  while  limiting 
and  suppressing,  did  not  vitally  injure  his  intellectual  man.  Want  of 
development  has  simply  kept  him  in  a dormant  and  ineffective  state, 
rendering  him  incapable  of  initiation  and  vigorous  prosecution. 

But  as  proof  that  his  two  and  a half  centuries  of  harsh  discipline 
has  not  injured  his  intellectual  man,  when  touched  by  the  wand  of 
wisdom,  he  blooms  into  a mechanical  genius  capable  of  devising  and 
planning  wonderful  structures,  flames  into  a mathematical  torch  ca- 
pable of  lighting  the  way  by  mathematical  competition  from  earth  to 
sky;  or  measuring  the  distances  of  the  stars  through  infinite  space; 
blossoms  into  oratory  which  sets  the  souls  of  men  on  fire  with  a thirst 
for  the  better  land;  or  holds  men  entranced  at  the  bar,  or  upon  the 
public  hustings ; or  bursts  into  musical  strains  that  hold  men  and  beasts 
with  the  spell  of  an  Orpheus. 

All  of  which  proves  that  his  intellectual  man  is  simply  unde- 
veloped and  undisciplined,  but  not  vitally  harmed,  and  compares  favor- 
ably with  the  intellectual  man  of  any  other  race  with  equal  opportu- 
nities and  undpr  eoual  circumstances. 


30 


RACE  IDEALS. 


So  that  we  shall  have  to  look  still  further,  shall  have  to  analyze 
and  examine  his  spiritual  man,  for  the  peculiar  disease,  or  weakness, 
of  the  Afro-American  race. 

THE  SPIRITUAL  MAN. 

We  will  lastly  take  into  consideration  the  spiritual  man  of  the 
composite  body  of  the  Afro-American,  the  first  member  of  the  trinity, 
the  master,  the  ruler,  of  composite  man,  and  see,  as  far  as  possible  un- 
der the  circumstances,  what  effect  his  two  and  a half  centuries  of  cruel 
and  destructive  training  had  on  him. 

By  comparing  him  with  the  spiritual  man  of  the  white  composite 
body,  or  even  the  spiritual  man  of  black  composite  bodies,  not  subjected 
to  the  adverse  training  that  made  him  what  he  is,  we  find  him  not 
only  weak  and  cowardly,  but,  what  is  worse  by  far,  self-depreciating. 

It  is  seen  that  he  possesses  inordinate  appreciation  for  the  com- 
posite man  with  a white  exterior,  and  corresponding  depreciation  for 
the  man  with  a black  exterior,  by  which  it  is  made  manifest  that  his 
long  years  of  oppression  and  harmful  training  have  dwarfed,  par- 
alyzed, or  mini  mized  his  spiritual  man,  and  made  him  not  only  feel 
less  than  a man,  but  ashamed  of  himself. 

And  contrasting  his  physical  man  in  his  low  state  of  poverty,  igno- 
rance, and  degradation,  (being  fed  on  such  food  for  so  many  centuries) 
with  the  physical  man  of  the  white  race  in  a state  of  wealth,  intel- 
ligence, power,  magnificence,  and  honor,  making  his  color  a badge  of 
honor,  has  caused  him  to  form  a very  low  estimate  of  his  own  physical 
man.  and  a correspondingly  high  estimate  of  the  physical  man  of  the 
white  race. 

In  fact,  the  contrast  has  developed  the  same  feelings  and  estimates 
in  both  races,  as  it  is  a law  of  Nature  for  the  same  conditions  to  de- 
velop the  same  feelings  in  the  people  who  are  a part  of  them  as  they 
do  in  the  people  who  are  above  them. 

The  people  kept  continuously  in  a low  condition  in  time,  come  to 
have  the  same  contempt  for  their  kind  as  those  in  the  higher  condition, 
and  at  times  more. 

In  other  words,  the  white  master,  in  his  seat  of  wealth,  intelli- 
gence, power,  magnificence,  and  honor,  contrasting  himself  with  his 
black  slave,  in  his  state  of  poverty,  ignorance,  helplessness,  and  degrad- 
ation, formed  no  lower  estimate  of  the  latter,  and  no  higher  estimate 
cf  himself,  than  the  latter  did. 

The  contrast  not  only  tended  to  make  the  master  class  proud  of 
the  higher  and  grander  condition  which  it  occupied,  but  of  its  color, 
which  came  to  be  a badge  of  that  condition,  while  it  tended  to  make 


THE  REMEDY. 


31 


the  black  man  ashamed  of  his  low  condition  and  of  las  color,  which 
finally  became  a badge  of  it. 

The  ideals,  models,  standards,  and  conditions  which  developed  a 
■pirit  in  the  white  master  to  appreciate  and  admire  the  superior  con- 
dition and  position  of  his  race,  and  to  honor  his  color  as  a badge  of 
it,  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  depreciate  and  condemn  the  low  and  de- 
spicable condition  of  his  black  slave,  and  to  dishonor  his  color  as  a 
badge  of  it,  on  the  other  hand,  developed  similar  feelings  in  the  black 
man  to  appreciate  the  white  man’s  color  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  de- 
preciate his  own  on  the  other. 

THE  FOOD  OF  COMPOSITE  MAN. 

Having  separated  composite  man  into  his  three  elemental  men, 
mechanical  man,  intellectual  man,  and  spiritual  man,  and  having 
shown  the  office  and  function  of  each,  we  will  now  proceed  to  show 
the  kind  of  food  necessary  to  a healthy  maintenance  of  each. 

Abstractly,  whatever  contributes  to  the  building  up,  or  strengthen- 
ing, of  mechanical  man,  is  physical  food,  of  which  we  may  concretely 
6pecifv  bread,  water,  and  exercise,  as  in  the  absence  of  either  one  of 
these,  physical  man  must  perish. 

Whatever  merely  contributes  to  the  strengthening,  or  broadening, 
of  the  reasoning  faculties,  or  the  devising  and  planning  powers  of  man, 
js  abstractly  intellectual  food,  of  which  we  may  concretely  speciy  such 
books  as  mathematics,  the  languages,  geography,  except  the  pictorial 
parts,  and  whatever  merely  tends  to  exercise  and  discipline  the  reason- 
ing faculties. 

Whatever  tends  to  excite  admiration,  disgust,  contempt,  pleasure 
or  displeasure,  courage  or  discourage,  is  abstractly  spiritual  food,  of 
which  we  may  specify  concretely  man,  in  a high  or  low  condition,  pict- 
ures, paintings,  models,  statuary,  monuments,  readers,  pictorial  geog- 
raphy, history,  novels,  newspapers,  shows,  etc. 

If  you  feed  the  spiritual  man  on  things  that  tend  to  excite  ad- 
miration and  pleasure,  you  prejudice  him  in  favor  of  such  things; 
and,  on  the  contrary,  if  you  feed  him  on  such  things  as  tend  to  excite 
disgust,  contempt,  or  anger,  you  not  only  prejudice  him  against  them, 
but  whatever  contributes  toward  their  production. 

Therefore  if  you  want  an  individual,  or  thing,  to  grow  in  favor, 
give  hii!\  or  it,  such  environment  or  place  as  will  excite  admiration,  or 
pleasure,  and  while  he,  or  it,  may  not  be  in  himself,  or  itself,  specially 
admirable,  he,  or  it,  will  more  and  more  share  in  the  admiration,  or 
pleasure,  excited  bv  his,  or  its,  surroundings  until  finally  he,  or  it,  will 
be  considered  a part  of  such  surroundings;  while,  on  the  contrary,  if 


32 


RACE  IDEALS. 


an  admirable  individual,  or  thing,  is  given  and  kept  in  such  surround- 
ings as  excite  contempt,  or  disgust,  in  time  he,  or  it,  will  be  considered 
a part  of  such  conditions,  even  for  a time  after  removal  from  them. 

This  is  why  the  white  master  and  all  connected  with  him  grew 
in  favor  not  only  with  his  own  class  all  the  time,  but  the  slaves  as 
well;  and  the  black  slave  grew  more  and  more  in  contempt,  not  only 
to  the  master  class,  but  to  himself  as  well. 

It  is  the  kind  of  spiritual  food  on  which  they  are  fed,  not  only  by 
observation,  but  from  books,  newspapers,  paintings,  models,  etc.,  which 
makes  Americans  so  prejudiced  against  black  in  the  hue  of  man. 

But  when  their  cause  is  made  plain  to  the  Afro-American,  as  we 
are  endeavoring  to  do,  from  that  moment  he  should  commence  to  study 
his  own  feelings  and  dispositions,  with  a view  to  establishing  if  any 
of  the  slave  is  still  in  himself;  and  if  any  of  the  symptoms  exposing 
the  slave  appear,  he  should  fight  with  the  same  desperation  to  destroy 
them,  as  he  would  a rattle-snake,  always  remembering  that  such  symp- 
toms are  impelled  by  a spirit,  which  had  its  inception  and  development 
in  the  institution  of  slavery,  and  will  make  a slave  while  alive. 

But,  to  add  to  the  misfortunes  of  the  Afro-American,  the  very 
same  means  and  training,  which  superinduced  his  low  and  degraded 
condition,  developed  self-depreciation,  and  caused  and  accustomed  him 
to  use  all  his  mechanical  and  economical  powers  to  keep  himself  in 
such  a condition  as  will  perpetuate  the  same  estimate  of  himself,  until 
it  is  eradicated. 

Successive  generations  of  both  races  developed  under  such  condi- 
tion, not  knowing  how  it  was  brought  about,  come  to  credit  their  col- 
ors respectively,  for  the  fortunate  condition  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
unfortunate  condition  on  the  other;  and  the  victim  of  the  latter  con- 
dition, though  suffering  from  all  the  horrors  which  it  inflicts,  is  un- 
consciously doing  even  more  to  maintain  it  than  the  beneficiaries  of 
his  suicidal  acts. 

That  spirit  which  was  developed  in  him  to  feel,  on  the  one  hand, 
that  it  is  a disgrace  to  serve  a member  of  his  own  race,  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  to  carry  everything  made  on  the  plantation  or  “Negro”’ 
quarters  to  “the  big  house”  or  master’s  quarters,  is  still  controlling 
him,  and  enriching  the  community  of  his  white  neighbor  at  the  cost 
of  his  own,  reproducing  in  effect  the  old  plantation  life  of  a high  place 
for  the  white  man  and  a low  place  for  the  black  man,  just  as  it  existed 
fifty  years  ago. 

Go  where  you  may  in  this  country,  North  or  South,  in  town  or 
country,  and  you  will  find  members  of  the  race  governed  by  the  same 


THE  REMEDY. 


6S 

old  spirit,  and  the  feelings  and  customs  which  it  engenders,  almost 
exclusively  laboring  for  members  of  the  white  race,  in  whose  favor 
they  almost  invariably  discriminate,  and  by  which  means  they  leave 
very  nearly  all  the  profits  from  their  'abor  on  its  side  of  the  ledger, 
where  they  also  leave  the  profits  from  their  patronage  by  discriminat- 
ing in  favor  of  the  commercial  men  of  that  race. 

In  that  way  they  are  unconsciously  and  involuntarily  doing  the 
6ame  service  and  making  the  same  conditions  for  the  respective  races 
that  existed  fifty  years  ago. 

Then  they  were  made  to  do,  by  the  cruel  and  arbitrary  white  mas- 
ter, outside  of  their  bodies,  now  they  are  impelled  to  do  the  same  things 
in  effect  as  then,  by  the  servile  white  spirit  within  them,  which  was 
developed  by  the  white  master  to  serve  his  purpose,  and  which  does  not 
regard  the  thirteenth,  fourteenth,  and  fifteenth  amendments  to  the 
Constitution. 

It  appears  that  the  Afro-American  is  making  an  effort  to  reverse 
the  law  of  development,  as  it  seems  that  he  is  using  his  means  and 
energy  to  change  his  color  in  order  to  better  his  condition,  instead  of 
trying  to  change  the  condition  which  disgraces  his  color. 

When  Jehovah’s  wheel  of  fortune  evolved  the  opportunity  to  train 
the  newlv  emancipated  freedman,  and  prepare  him  to  meet  the  respon- 
sibilhies  imposed  by  his  new  relations  of  citizenship,  that  the  exist- 
ing system  of  education  was  planned  and  developed  for  free  men,  in 
a state  of  freedom,  and  had  no  place,  nor  plan,  for  training  men  out 
of  a condition  of  slavery,  appears  to  have  been  absolutely  overlooked. 

So  the  Afro-American,  while  physically  free,  but  still  a mechanical 
and  spiritual  slave,  was  incorporated  into  that  system  without  putting 
a single  addition  to  its  curricula  to  change  the  spirit,  and  rid  him  of 
the  customs,  habits,  and  traditions,  which  make  slaves;  and  which  will 
prevent  him  from  attaining  and  enjoying  the  estate  of  a free  man,  un- 
til he  is  rid  of  them,  and  until  the  spirit  which  impels  them  is  changed, 
whether  done  in  one  generation,  or  a thousand  years. 

A system  of  education,  which  w’as  planned  and  developed  to  fit 
upon  a traditionally  free  foundation,  was,  and  is,  being  placed  upon  a 
traditionally  slavish  foundation,  in  one  and  the  same  individual,  is 
producing  a contradictory  and  paradoxical  man,  and  the  remedy  is 
neither  in  more  mechanical  training,  nor  more  of  such  intellectual 
training  as  is  now  contained  in  that  system  of  education,  hut  such  ad- 
ditions to  it  as  would  result  in  changing  a slavish  spirit  and  destroy- 
ing ancient  traditions. 

When  the  two  antagonistic  systems  were  unscientifically  thrown 
together,  and  neutralized  each  other,  or  the  system  of  acquired  learn- 


34 


RACE  IDEALS. 


ing  for  the  man  with  a free  tradition  destroyed  the  efficiency  of  the 
slave,  and  the  traditional  slavish  training  destroyed  the  utility  of  the 
free  composite  man,  producing  a more  and  more  contradictory  prod- 
uct, the  world  stood  dumbfounded  and  confused,  and  the  cry  was  sent 
abroad  that  the  white  man’s  education  was  injurious  to  the  black  man, 
and  would  ruin  both  races  and  the  country  if  the  policy  of  forcing  it 
into  him  were  persisted  in. 

Since  which  time,  country  wide,  interest  in  the  higher  education 
of  the  Afro-American  has  ceased  more  and  more,  and  nearly  all  his 
friends,  North  and  South,  have  settled  down  on  the  very  erroneous  and 
harmful  assumption  that  all  that  is  needed  toward  his  proper  advance- 
ment, is  to  refine  and  polish  his  traditional  mechanical  training,  by 
making  him  a better  mechanic,  or  a more  skillful  artisan — in  short,  a 
more  highly  productive  tool  in  his  developed,  than  he  was  in  his  crude 
state,  which  may  prove  a greater  advantage  to  others  than  to  himself, 
unless  at  the  same  time  he  is  rid  of  some  of  his  other  traditional 
training. 

While  the  product  of  industrial  training  is  more  productive  by 
reason  of  his  greater  skill,  and  may,  and  sometimes  does,  add  a little 
more  to  his  individual  holdings,  owing  to  his  disposition  to  discrimi- 
nate against  himself  with  the  results  of  his  skill,  such  training  in  it- 
self tends  to  broaden  the  economic  chasm  between  the  two  races,  whose 
breadth  is  now  the  main  cause  of  the  afflictions  of  his  race,  whose 
political  equality  can  never  be  attained  during  the  existence  of  such 
great  economic  inequality,  whereby  his  greater  misdirected  productive 
power  in  some  measure  harms  rather  than  helps  his  race. 

If  he  is  to  be  made  an  aid  to  the  cause  of  his  race,  and,  in  the 
last  analysis,  the  best  possible  aid  to  himself,  while  he  is  being  devel- 
oped into  a man  of  skill  and  productive  power,  he  must  at  the  same 
time  receive  such  spiritual  and  economic  training,  as  would  impel  him 
to  use  the  skill  and  power  acquired  in  building  up  industries  and  bus- 
iness places,  in  which  his  offspring  would  find  employment  above  meni- 
als or  scavengers,  to  which  ancient  custom  assigned  them. 

Experience  gained,  in  seeing  the  use  that  the  highly  skilled  Afro- 
American  mechanic  and  artisan  developed  in  the  ante-bellum  day* 
(who  generally  died  paupers)  made  of  the  results  of  their  skill  and 
productive  powers,  reminds  us  that  something  in  addition  to  indus- 
trial training  is  necessary  to  the  Afro-American  youth,  if  it  is  ever  to 
maintain  itself  on  an  equal  plane  of  American  citizenship. 

He  must  be  trained  to  see  that  the  profits  from  his  investments 
and  business  may  help  himself  only,  but  the  profits  from  his  produc- 
tion and  consumption,  his  labor  and  patronage,  are  the  real  factor* 


THE  REMEDY. 


35 


in  race-building,  and  that,  if  used  in  favor  of  his  race  instead  of  against 
it,  as  is  usually  the  case,  he  will  help  his  race;  otherwise  he  may  more 
than  neutralize  all  that  he  has  accomplished  individually. 

The  question  often  arises  as  to  the  cause  of  the  increase  of  preju- 
dice in  Northern,  or  Western,  communities  against  the  Afro-Americans, 
where  there  was  little,  or  none,  prior  to  their  settlement,  which  is  be- 
coming more  and  more  acute. 

Some  assign  the  cause  to  the  increased  number  of  Southern  white 
people,  who  inoculate  the  whites  among  whom  they  settle  with  their 
peculiar  prejudices;  others  to  the  unfriendly  attitude  of  the  metropoli- 
tan press,  which  carries  its  venom  into  the  many  homes  of  the  land 
daily ; and  still  another  class  assign  the  cause  to  the  very  large  num- 
ber of  immoral  colored  people  who  are  drifting  from  the  South. 

A part  of  such  increased  prejudice  may  be  due  to  all  the  causes 
assigned,  but  there  is  still  a greater  source  of  prejudice  than  all  of 
them  combined,  which  is  found  in  the  low  conditions,  which  a hostile 
spirit  and  ancient  customs,  cause  Afro-Americans  to  develop  for  them- 
selves, wherever  they  go. 

It  must  be  understood  that  the  conditions  which  prejudice  one 
part  of  the  human  family  will  prejudice  another. 

The  Afro-American’s  source  of  prejudice  is  the  habits,  customs, 
and  manners,  by  which  he  makes  his  the  poorest  community  in  coun- 
try or  town,  and  himself  the  menial  and  scavenger  class  of  his  own 
community. 

\ 

All  people,  be  they  black  or  white,  despise  a low  condition,  and 
have  a contempt  for  its  occupants,  and  people  are  usually  rated  by 
their  economic  condition,  in  spite  of  law,  or  religion,  under  the  white 
man’s  civilization,  where  material  wealth  is  made  the  standard  of  fit- 
ness, and  there  is  going  to  remain  the  same  prejudice  in  the  South, 
and  similar  prejudice  will  be  developed  elsewhere  under  similar  cir- 
cumstances, as  long  as  the  Afro-American  race  retains  the  same  eco- 
nomic relation  to  the  white  race  that  it  does. 

The  same  training,  or  spirit,  which  causes  the  Afro-American  to 
discriminate  against  himself  with  his  labor  and  patronage,  in  favor  of 
the  white  man,  causes  the  white  man  to  disbar  him  from  all  employ- 
ment above  menials  and  scavengers  in  this  country. 

THE  THREE  CHIEF  MALADIES. 

The  race  is  afflicted  with  three  very  painful  maladies,  which  it 
had  no  original  part  in  creating,  but  which,  owing  to  the  training 
given  to  produce,  and  for  lack  of  the  necessary  training  to  eradicate. 


36 


RACE  IDEALS. 


it  is  perpetuating,  though  constantly  writhing  in  the  pains  which  they 
inflict. 

The  first  and  most  serious  of  these  is  spiritual  degradation,  the 
principle  impelling  it  to  depreciate  itself,  caused  by  being  forced  to  oc- 
cupy such  a low  and  disgraceful  economic  position  for  centuries  as 
made  its  color  a badge  of  dishonor,  and  the  destruction  or  transference 
of  its  ideal  man  to  the  white  race,  by  which  it  was  deprived  of  the 
fountain  of  race  pride,  upon  which  family  and  individual  pride  and 
self-respect  are  built. 

Next  in  importance  to  spiritual  degradation  in  its  destructive 
properties,  is  the  economic  ignorance  of  the  race,  or  its  deprivation  of 
even  such  knowledge  of  business  affairs  as  is  possessed  by  the  crudest 
wild  tribe  in  a natural  state  of  freedom,  by  reason  of  it  being  denied, 
on  the  one  hand,  the  privilege  of  producing  and  exchanging  or  sell- 
ing the  smallest  articles  of  consumption,  which  would  have  kept  the 
thought  and  conversation  of  the  elders  in  the  business  world,  by 
means  of  which  business  traditions  are  transferred  to  the  offspring; 
end  on  the  other  hand,  the  denial  of  such  employment  in  the  economic 
world  as  would  engage  the  attention  and  thought  of  members  of  the 
race,  and  in  consequence  such  a trend  of  conversation  as  would  have  a 
tendency  to  restore  economic  traditions,  by  keeping  the  range  of  the 
thought  of  the  young  continuously  on  business  matters. 

While  the  white  ideal  of  the  race  is  classed  here  as  third  in  the 
galaxy  of  destructive  maladies  of  the  Afro-American  race,  as  spiritual 
degradation  has  its  foundation  in  it,  in  some  measure,  it  should  be 
classed  as  the  first  and  most  important  of  the  three  evils,  as  probably 
the  greatest  curse  that  can  be  visited  on  a people  is  the  loss  of  their 
human  ideals. 

Nature’s  God  has  placed  the  ideal  of  all  species  of  the  animal 
kingdom,  great  or  small,  in  themselves,  which  is  evidenced  by  the  self- 
appreciation and  self-defense  of  even  the  smallest  insect,  and  in  its 
inclination  to  be  drawn  to  its  own  kind. 

As  all  other  members  of  a community  lose  respect  for  that  one, 
who  so  far  loses  respect  and  admiration  for  himself,  as  to  be  always 
aping  and  imitating  some  other  member,  in  the  same  way  and  for  the 
same  reason  all  other  tribes,  or  races,  lose  respect  for  that  tribe,  or  race, 
which  has  so  far  lost  respect  and  admiration  for  itself,  that  it  is  al- 
ways imitating,  or  trying  to  be  like,  some  other  tribe,  race,  or  nation, 
as  Afro-Americans  are  doing. 

Members  of  that  race  can  never  hope  to  gain  the  respect  and  ad- 
miration of  others  before  they  shall  have  gained  their  own  respect  and 
admiration. 


THE  REMEDY. 


37 

A scientific  remedy,  or  cure,  for  tlie  ills  of  the  Afro-American 
race  would  restore  its  race  ideals,  rehabilitate  its  spiritual  man,  and 
provide  for  its  economic  knowledge. 

THE  NEEDED  SYSTEM  OF  TRAINING  FOR  AFRO-AMERICANS. 

Broadly  speaking,  that  race  needs  a system  of  education,  which 
would  restore  its  lost  ideals,  rehabilitate  its  spiritual  man,  provide 
ways  and  means  for  its  economic  knowledge,  redevelop  its  pride  of 
race,  and  destroy  the  traits,  characteristics,  habits,  customs,  and  man- 
ners, which  were  developed  in  it  to  make  slaves,  and  by  which  its  mem- 
bers are  still  most  largely  governed. 

Such  needs  bring  us  to  a consideration  and  examination  of  the 
existing  system  of  education  with  a view  to  establishing  whether  it 
is  fully  prepared  to  meet  the  peculiar  educational  requirements  of  that 
race  or  not. 

The  existing  system  was  devised,  planned,  and  developed  to  meet 
the  educational  needs  of  a race  in  a natural  state  of  freedom,  and  not 
a single  addition  has  been  made  to  its  curricula  to  answer  the  crying 
needs  of  the  Afro-American  race,  in  its  secondary  state  of  freedom; 
no  addition  has  been  devised  for  destroying  the  destructive  traits,  cus- 
toms, and  habits,  which  a slavish  tradition  has  made  a part  of  the  life 
of  that  race,  and  to  restore  the  things  necessary  to  make  proud,  self- 
respecting  beings,  which  the  institution  of  slavery  found  necessary  to 
destroy  in  it  in  order  to  make  slaves. 

In  fact,  the  existing  system  of  education  was  founded  upon  the 
philosophy  of  human  slavery,  and  upon  the  theory  that  all  black  men 
are  inferiors,  which  causes  it  to  be  a hot-house  of  human  hatred  and 
prejudice,  and  as  such  it  is  still  breeding  the  feelings  of  master  in  the 
white  race,  and  slaves  in  the  black  race. 

A critical  examination  of  the  text-books,  the  means  provided  by 
the  system  for  training  the  youths  of  both  races,  will  verify  these 
truths.  An  examination  of  the  primer,  the  first  book  placed  in  the 
bands  of  the  vouths  of  both  races,  will  reveal  the  fact  that  the  old 
slave  principle  of  putting  the  white  master  in  a proud  and  command- 
ing position  and  the  black  slave  in  a low  and  humiliating  position  is 
still  followed,  as  a proud  and  most  highly  developed  model  of  the  white 
race  is  always  selected,  concerning  whom  the  lesson  is  always  such  as 
to  excite  the  pride  and  aspiration  of  members  of  that  race,  while  the 
models  selected  of  the  black  race  are  either  caricatures,  or  of  the  low- 
est tvpes,  and  the  lesson  concerning  whom  is  such  as  to  destroy  hi9 
pride  and  make  the  hlack  child  ashamed  of  himself  and  race,  and  to 
breed  contempt  in  the  white  child  for  his  fellow-student  of  that  race. 


3b 


RACE  IDEALS. 


This  principle  is  continued  in  all  succeeding  readers  and  the  ge- 
ographies and  histories  in  use,  whose  chief  object  should  be  to  inspire 
the  youth  with  pride  and  aspiration,  by  the  recitals  of  the  noble  and 
heroic  deeds  of  their  forefathers  revealed  in  them,  which  is  accom- 
plished for  the  white  children.  But  notwithstanding  that  the  ancestry 
of  the  Afro-American  youth  has  aided  in  making  this  country  all  that 
it  is;  that  through  Crispus  Attucks,  on  the  plains  of  Boston,  it  shed 
the  first  blood  in  the  Revolutionary  War,  and  suffered  and  fought 
with  Washington  in  his  dismal  campaigns  at  Valley  Forge  and  Cam- 
bridge, shared  the  battles  of  Greene  in  the  Carolinas  and  Perry  on 
Lake  Champlain,  and  mingled  its  voice  in  the  loud  acclaim  of  victory 
at  Yorktown;  notwithstanding  it  shared  in  the  great  triumphs  of 
Jackson  and  other  heroic  leaders  in  the  war  with  Great  Britain  in 
1812,  and  shared  in  the  triumphal  procession  of  Harrison  and  Scott 
in  the  war  with  Mexico;  notwithstanding  that  the  Union  arms  failed, 
and  the  Eebellion  triumphed  in  18G1  and  1862,  until  their  suffering 
ancestry,  which  God  intended  should  take  part  in  its  own  liberation, 
was  called  up  from  the  cotton-fields  and  rice-swamps,  furnished  with 
the  implements  of  war,  covered  with  Old  Glory,  and  by  its  bravery  and 
daring  reversed  the  fortunes  of  war  in  favor  of  the  Stars  and  Stripes, 
led  the  vanguard  of  the  all-conquering  armies  of  Grant,  Sherman,  and 
Sheridan,  and  contributed  most  largely  to  the  triumph  of  the  Union 
arms  and  its  restoration;  and  notwithstanding  in  the  late  war  with 
Spain  it  was  concededly  the  brave  and  heroic  deeds  of  the  black  bat- 
talions that  chiefly  brought  victory  to  the  American  arms — notwith- 
standing all  this,  the  histories  used  in  school-rooms  for  youths  of  both 
races  are  silent  on  the  part  played  in  the  building  and  defense  of  the 
country  by  the  ancestry  of  the  Afro-American  youth. 

There  should  be  no  wonder  that  such  a system  of  education  is  pro- 
ducing the  most  haughty  and  prejudiced  class  of  white  people  against 
black  people  on  earth,  and  a class  of  black  people  with  less  pride  and 
self-respect  than  any  other  black  people  in  the  world. 

There  should  be  no  surprise  that  such  a system  is  educating  the 
Afro-American  race  out  of  harmony  with  itself,  and  developing  such 
a spirit  in  its  educated  members  as  inclines  them  to  seek  white  com- 
munities, to  get  as  far  away  as  possible  from  members  of  their  own 
race,  whom  they  seek  every  occasion  to  criticise  as  harshly  as  the  white 
race,  and  thereby  destroy  the  utility  of  their  learning. 

Having  shown  the  character  of  the  existing  system,  its  incom- 
pleteness and  harmful  traits,  and  experience  in  the  results  of  its  opera- 
tion all  the  better  prepares  us  for  suggesting  needed  additions  and 
modifications. 


3U 


' THE  a EMI ii/i  . 

NEEDED  MODIFICATIONS. 

The  psychological  results  of  the  present  system  of  education,  its 
spiritual  effects  upon  both  races,  suggest  the  wisdom  of  such  modifica- 
tion in  its  ideals,  models,  and  teachings,  as  would  produce  a different 
spiritual  nature  in  both  races,  and  give  us  a different  class  of  human 
beings,  resulting  in  a happier  and  more  generally  prosperous  country. 

The  injurious  traits,  habits,  customs,  and  manners,  which  the 
institution  of  slavery  developed  in  the  Afro-American,  not  possessed 
by  the  white  man,  for  whom  the  existing  system  of  education  was  de- 
veloped, and  which  make  some  plan  necessary  lor  eradication,  not 
found  in  that  system,  demand  such  additions  to  that  system,  as 
would  meet  the  peculiar  needs  of  that  race. 

The  Afro-American  race  really  stands  in  need  of  a system  of 
training,  found  neither  in  its  traditions,  nor  the  existing  educational 
plan,  without  which  it  must  go  on  for  many  generations,  blindly 
stumbling,  falling,  and  committing  suicide,  and  making  itself  the 
laughing-stock,  and  incurring  the  contempt,  of  the  world. 

It  needs  and  must  have  a system  of  moral  philosophy,  which  wall, 
starting  in  the  primer  in  an  elemental  form,  point  out,  consider,  and 
emphasize  every  defect  developed  in  the  race  and  made  a part  of  its 
tradition  to  make  slaves,  with  a view  to  purifying  and  repairing  the 
traditional  foundation  so  as  to  put  it  in  harmony  with  the  superstruct- 
ural  plan  of  acquired  learning,  in  order  that  the  former  might  not 
neutralize  and  destroy  the  effects  of  the  latter,  „s  it  is  now  doing. 

A plan  must  be  found  to  assist  in  restoring  the  human  ideals  of 
the  fro-An  erica n race  as  a means  of  redeveloping  its  self-apprecia- 
tion and  self-defense,  the  want  of  which  is  entailing  untold  suffering 
and  humiliation  on  its  members. 

The  Afro-American’s  spiritual  appetite  has  been  exclusively  fed, 
for  three  hundred  years,  on  white  ideals,  models,  idols,  standards,  real 
and  artistic,  which  has  resulted,  in  some  respects,  in  developing  the 
spirit  of  a white  man  in  a black  man’s  body,  causing  the  spirit  to  be 
ashamed  of,  and  dissatisfied  with,  the  body  in  which  it  dwells;  and  in 
order  to  stop  such  harmful  results,  the  food  must  be  reversed. 

To  teach  members  of  that  race  the  full  value  of  their  production 
and  consumption,  that  they  may  use  them  in  a wav  to  change  their 
unhappy,  wretched,  economic  condition,  a way  must  be  found  to  make 
up  for  the  failure  in  the  tradition  of  the  race,  to  put  the  mind  of  its 
offspring  in  a business  sphere. 

The  third  is  white  ideals. 

One  of  the  greatest  curses  that  can  come  upon  anv  people  is  the 

loss  of  their  human  ideals. 


40 


RACE  IDEALS. 


Nature’s  God  has  placed  the  ideal  of  every  member  of  the  animal 
kingdom  in  itself,  which  is  evidenced  in  its  self-appreciation  and  self- 
defense,  and  in  its  inclination,  in  a natural  state,  to  be  drawn  to  its 
kind. 

As  all  other  members  of  a community  lose  respect  for  that  mem- 
ber who,  because  he  has  lost  respect  and  admiration  for  himself,  is 
always  trying  to  be  like  some  other  person,  all  other  tribes,  or  races, 
lose  respect  for  any  other  tribe,  or  race,  which  places  such  a low  esti- 
mate on  itself,  that  it  is  always  aping  and  trying  to  be  like  some  other 
tribe,  race,  or  nation. 

Nothing  injures  a race  so  much  as  the  loss  of  its  human  ideals. 

A scientific  remedy,  or  cure,  for  the  Afro-American’s  disease  would 
be  one  that  would  restore  his  race  ideals. 

POLITICAL  ECONOMY. 

For  convenience,  let  us  first  take  the  Afro-American’s  economic 
state  under  consideration;  his  ignorance  of  economic  laws  and  its  ef- 
fects and  bearings  on  the  destiny  of  himself  and  offspring. 

Political  economy  is  that  branch  of  knowledge,  which  deals  with 
the  operation  and  effect  of  business  laws,  and  therefore  has  more  to 
do  with  making,  or  unmaking,  a people  than  any  other  branch  of 
knowledge ; yet  Afro-Americans  are  more  densely  ignorant  of  practical 
political  economy  than  any  other  branch  of  knowledge. 

As  ignorance  of  economic  laws  makes  a people  the  slaves,  or  tools 
of  those  learned  in  them,  the  freedom  of  a people  may  be  measured  by 
the  extent  of  their  economic  knowledge,  compared  with  that  of  their 
neighbors. 

If  the  Afro-American  possessed  a separate  government,  owing  to 
his  economic  ignorance  and  predisposition  to  discriminate  with  his 
labor  and  patronage  against  himself,  it  would  only  be  a question  of 
time  before  his  government  would  either  fall,  or  pass  into  the  hands 
of  others,  because  he  would  not  retain  sufficient  profits  from  his  pro- 
duction and  consumption  within  his  own  nation  to  sustain  it.  This 
is  shown  by  the  poverty,  caused  bv  his  discrimination  against  himself 
with  his  labor,  patronage,  or  influence,  of  every  community  occupied 
by  him,  whether  in  the  rural  district,  or  city. 

There  are  two  reasons  for  his  continued  ignorance  of  political 
•economy,  one  of  which  originates  in  his  want  of  economic  traditions, 
and  the  other  in  that  scheme  of  political  economy,  which  excludes  him 
from  such  employment  in  the  economic  world,  as  would  enable  him  to 
flrain  practical  knowledge  of  business  affairs. 


THE  REMEDY. 


41 


The  Afro-American’s  want  of  economic,  or  business,  knowledge  is 
attributed  to  the  following  facts  and  general  laws: 

Children  get  all  their  first  impressions  of  life  and  their  ambi- 
tion, aspiration,  and  bent  of  mind  from  the  habits  and  conversation 
of  their  elders  or  playfellows. 

Therefore,  that  system  of  political  economy  which  denied  the 
parentage  of  the  Afro-American  the  privilege  of  bartering  and  ex- 
changing his  production  and  consumption,  excluding  him  from  all  bus- 
iness activity,  and  in  consequence  put  his  thoughts  and  conversation 

outside  of  that  sphere,  deprived  him  and  his  offspring  of  economic 
traditions. 

It  it  a general  law  of  Nature  that  people  think  about  their  busi- 
ness, or  occupation,  and  talk  about  what  they  think  about,  and  it  is 
this  acting  and  talking  of  the  elders,  that  first  absorbs  the  tender  eyes, 
ears,  and  mind  or  thought  of  the  offspring,  which  it  gets  without  any 
effort  either  on  its  own,  or  the  part  of  its  parentage,  and  we  designate 
such  acquirement  economic  traditions. 

In  conversation  generally,  there  is  an  exchange  of  views,  not  only 
resulting  in  benefit,  or  harm,  to  those  engaged  in  it,  but  to  those  who 
listen  as  well.  Therefore,  the  right  kind  of  conversation,  by  parents 
and  elders  in  the  presence  of  the  young,  is  of  immeasurable  benefit. 

On  conversation,  hinges  the  weakest,  or  strongest,  link  of  en- 
vironment. Children,  possessing  an  environment  with  a high  range  of 
thought  and  conversation,  are  just  as  fortunate  as  those,  who  possess 
one  with  a low  range  of  thought  and  conversation,  are  unfortunate. 

Conversation  is  not  only  very  largely  the  creator  of  character,  but 
the  barometer  by  which  character  is,  or  should  be,  measured.  That  is 
the  reason  why  children  are  so  greatly  helped,  or  hindered,  by  their 
environment. 

One’s  range  of  thought  very  seldom  wanders  beyond  his  environ- 
ment, or  association,  unless  there  are  special  plans,  or  schemes  of  train- 
ing for  carrying  them  beyond  such  limits. 

Because  the  home  environments  are  inadequate,  our  educational 
system  is  established  to  give  the  breadth  and  depth  of  thought  neces- 
sary to  produce  a fully  equipped  man  or  woman,  and,  in  consequence 
of  the  difference  in  tradition,  it  may  be  complete  for  one  class  of  peo- 
ple while  greatly  incomplete  for  another. 

The  educational  system  of  the  master  class  of  this  country,  whose 
children  have  such  immense  advantages  in  environment  and  tradition, 
may  be  complete  for  that  race,  but  very  incomplete  for  the  children  of 
the  slave  class,  with  had  environments  and  wrong  traditions,  as  the 
latter  class  not  only  wants  all  done  for  it,  and  more,  that  is  done  for 


42 


RACE  WE  ALE. 


the  former,  but  wants  a great  deal  that  is  done  in  the  home,  or  tradi- 
tional training,  undone. 

The  benefits,  which  fortunate  environments  give,  are  called  in- 
heritance by  many  people,  but  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  the 
child’s  range  of  thought  is  that  of  its  environment,  which  may  cause 
a child  of  tender  years,  on  the  one  hand,  to  think  and  talk  like  an 
elder,  while  causing  an  elder,  on  the  other  hand,  to  think  and  talk 
like  a child. 

It  is  in  this  way  that  business  people  usually  perpetuate  business 
people,  and  laboring  people  perpetuate  laboring  people. 

The  mind,  of  a child  in  a home  full  of  business  activity  and 
thought,  voluntarily  ranges  in  the  business  sphere,  without  special  ef- 
fort either  on  its  own,  or  its  parents’,  part. 

When  the  parentage  of  the  Afro-American  race  was  denied  the 
chance  to  develop  economic  traditions,  it  could  not  transmit  to  its  off- 
spring any  business,  or  economic,  knowledge. 

The  advantages  and  disadvantages  of  economic  traditions  may  be 
contrasted  in  the  range  of  conversation  among  a group  of  white  men 
and  that  of  a group  of  colored  men.  If  you  will  lend  ear  to  the  con- 
versation of  a group  of  the  former,  in  ninety-nine  out  of  a hundred 
cases  it  is  on  business,  while  in  forty-nine  out  of  fifty  cases  the  range 
of  conversation  of  a group  of  the  latter  is  on  anything  except  business. 
His  mind  not  being  used  to  that  range  of  thought,  it  makes  the  aver- 
age Afro-American  tired  to  talk  business  to  him,  and  if  you  persist  in 
a business  conversation,  you  are  liable  to  scatter  his  company. 

He  is  not  only  suffering  by  reason  of  his  loss  of  economic  tradi- 
tion, but  for  the  additional  reason  that  he  is  barred  from  all  employ- 
ment that  would  necessarily  put  and  keep  his  range  of  thought  in  the 
business  sphere,  which  would  finally  restore  his  lost  economic  traditions. 

As  business  knowledge,  or  political  economy,  consists  in  the  knowl- 
edge and  skill  to  handle  the  production  and  consumption  of  man  with 
a view  to  making  profit  out  of  them,  upon  which  all  profits  and  for- 
tunes are  made,  the  Afro-American  cannot  hope  to  be  anythin"  but 
a hewer  of  wood  and  a drawer  of  water  for  many  decades  to  come, 
unless  special  provisions  are  made  in  his  educational  system  to  give 
that  knowledge  of  business  not  found  in  his  tradition,  and  of  which 
his  exclusion  from  such  employment  in  the  economic  world  as  would 
in  time  develop  deprives  him. 

His  problem  of  economic  ignorance,  like  that  of  spiritual  degrada- 
tion, can  onlv  be  solved  by  a process  of  systematic  training  in  a sys- 
tem of  political  economy  especially  designed  to  meet  his  needs. 

Judsred  bv  the  manner  in  which  they  spend  their  patronage  and 


THE  REMEDY . 


43 


influence,  the  most  intelligent  members  of  his  race  have  not  yet  learned 
that  value  of  money  which  makes  honorable  employment,  a marriage 
portion,  and  respectability  for  a people,  as,  generally  speaking,  they 
are  not  using  their  patronage  and  influence  to  even  make  a place  for 
themselves. 

in  making  him  the  greatest  producer  and  smallest  consumer  in 
his  community,  the  institution  of  slavery  gave  the  Afro-American  a 
great  advantage,  and  if  that  had  not  been  neutralized  by  his  economic 
ignorance  and  white  ideals,  he  would  to-day  be  one  of  the  strongest 
commercial  and  financial  factors  of  this  country. 

In  its  devious  ramifications,  from  producer  to  consumer,  he  has 
never  learned  to  see  and  follow  the  ever-increasing  value  of  his  dollar, 
after  it  leaves  his  hands,  with  a view  to  learning,  before  spending  it, 
what  influence  for  good,  or  bad,  its  ever-expanding  powers  may  have 
on  the  destiny  of  himself  and  offspring. 

His  economic  ignorance  is  proving  a double-acting  gun,  which 
at  every  discharge  kills  all  of  his  kind  in  the  rear  as  well  as  in  front 
of  it.  In  his  industrial  world  his  want  of  business  knowledge  is  kill- 
ing the  employer  as  well  as  the  employed;  in  his  commercial  world  it 
is  killing  the  merchant  as  well  as  his  patrons;  in  his  professional  world 
it  is  killing  the  professional  man  as  well  as  his  clientele;  and  in  his 
world  of  leadership  it  is  killing  the  leaders  as  well  as  their  followers. 

THE  AFRO-AMERICAN  INDUSTRIAL  CAPTAIN. 

In  the  industrial  world,  the  Afro-American  employer  has  to  com- 
pete with  men  of  great  experience  in  handling  labor,  and  he  is  not 
jet  sufficiently  informed  in  all  the  attending  disadvantages  connected 
with  a member  of  his  race  as  employer,  not  only  all  the  delicate  con- 
siderations which  develop  the  likes  and  dislikes  of  employees,  or  the 
inducements  offered  by  competitors  to  draw  his  employees  away  from 
him.  or  the  diplomacy  used  by  shrewd  employers  to  impress  the  em- 
ployed with  the  feelings  of  brotherhood,  with  a view  to  securing  the 
best  results,  but  in  the  more  delicate  knowledge  of  how  to  employ,  and 
handle,  men  of  his  own  race,  in  whom  years  of  training  has  developed 
c feeling,  that  it  is  a disgrace  to  serve  another  member  of  their  race. 

THE  AFRO-AMERICAN  COMMERCIAL  CAPTAIN. 

In  competitions  with  the  long-trained  classes  of  other  races,  in 
the  field  of  commercialism,  not  only  does  his  economic  ignorance  put 
him  at  a great  disadvantage  for  want  of  the  knowledge  to  take  into 
consideration,  in  every  business  transaction,  in  every  purchase  or  sale, 
whether  great  or  small,  those  commercial  comities,  which  force  the  sue- 


44 


RACE  IDEALS. 


cessful  business  man  to  buy  his  goods  at  sueh  prices  as  will  enable 
him  to  meet  competition,  and  to  sell  at  such  prices  as  will  draw  the 
business  of  his  community  or  business  sphere  to  himself,  and  the  bus- 
iness manners  used  by  the  successful  business  man  to  impress  his  pa- 
trons to  feel  that  they  are  the  masters  and  he  is  there  to  serve  them, 
but  the  more  important  fact  that,  by  reason  of  the  feelings  which  the 
institution  of  slavery  has  developed  in  both  races  with  regard  to  the 
sphere  of  employment  for  members  of  his  race,  and  ancient  customs, 
he  has  a harder  road  to  hoe  than  any  of  his  competitors,  and  to  be  suc- 
cessful he  must  make  greater  sacrifices. 

In  rendering  services  and  making  charges,  economic  ignorance 
very  often  prevents  the  Afro-American  professional  man  from  taking 
into  consideration  the  services  and  charges  of  competitors  in  other 
races,  and  all  the  smooth  manners  and  winsome  ways  used  by  them  to 
gain  and  retain  their  patronage. 

In  short,  Afro-American  industrial  and  commercial  captains,  and 
professional  men  generally,  will  have  to  learn  sufficient  of  the  opera- 
tion and  effect  of  economic  laws  to  know  that  it  is  only  their  ability 
to  compete  in  value  of  service,  in  price,  and  good  manners,  with  their 
competitors  in  hiring  and  dealing  with  their  help,  in  buying  and  sell- 
ing their  wares,  or  in  rendering,  and  charging  for,  their  services,  espe- 
cially in  fields  where  they  are  regarded  as  interlopers,  that  will  enable 
them  to  hold  their  own. 

They  will  have  to  learn  that  unobstructed  economic  laws  are 
unerring  in  their  operation,  and  exact  the  same  consideration  for  the 
same  service,  commodity,  quantity,  or  quality,  from  all  who  would 
profit  by  them,  and  visit  the  same  destruction  or  calamity  on  the 
heads  of  those  who,  through  ignorance,  or  greed,  violate  their  man- 
dates; they  will  have  to  learn  further,  that  those  laws  have  laid  it  down 
as  an  inviolable  rule,  that  those  who  take  an  unfair  advantage  in  their 
business  transactions  to-day,  who  charge  more  to-dav  for  their  com- 
modities and  services  than  they  should,  and  treat  their  patrons  and 
employees  in  an  unbecoming  manner,  ‘will  most  likely  have  less  busi- 
ness to-morrow. 

Economic  ignorance  even  prevents  the  so-called  educated  mem- 
bers of  the  Afro-American  race  from  realizing  that  before  they  can 
ever  have  anything  like  an  equal  chance  in  life,  or  can  be  recognized 
as  equal  citizens,  they  must  get  all  the  values  out  of  their  productions 
and  consumptions  secured  by  members  of  the  white  race;  that  when 
they  are  denied  every  advantage  in  business  made  by  their  patronage, 
in  the  honors  and  emoluments  of  a government,  for  the  support  of 
which  they  are  equally  taxed,  that  other  people  enjoy,  they  are  de- 


THE  REMEDY. 


45 


humanized,  put  on  a level  with  dumb  brutes,  not  classed  with  the 
human  family,  and  that  such  an  outrage  will  remain  as  long  as  they 
spend  their  patronage  and  influence  in  support  of  it. 

Before  Afro-Americans  will  ever  be  regarded  as  human  beings,  or 
equal  citizens,  they  will  have  to  learn  to  spend  their  labor,  money,  and 
influence  not  merely  to  secure  a passing  support,  like  the  hog,  or  coyv, 
eat  and  drink  to-day  and  die  to-morrow,  but  to  spend  them  in  such 
a way  that  they  will  give  them  any  employment,  honor,  marriage  por- 
tion, or  influence  enjoyed  by  other  members  of  the  human  race,  even 
if  they  have  to  sacrifice  a part  of  the  immediate  purchasing  power  of 
their  labor  or  money  in  so  doing. 

By  reason  of  spending  their  labor,  money,  and  influence  exclu- 
sively with  a race  of  people  who  have,  after  the  reception  of  which, 
denied  them  a place  where  they  might  receive  some  returns  from  the 
wealth  they  are  aiding  to  produce  like  other  oeople,  in  high-salaried 
employment,  Afro-Americans  are  growing  comparatively  poorer  and 
poorer  every  day  of  their  lives,  as  the  people  wrho  are  getting  the  prof- 
its from  their  productions  and  consumptions  as  well  as  their  owu 
are  not  only  retaining  them  in  every  way,  except  what  little  that  is 
given  them  as  menials  and  scavengers,  but  are  denying  them  the  em- 
ployment which  might  in  some  way  compensate  for  loss  along  other 
lines. 

THE  POSSIBLE  EARNING  CAPACITY  OF  ONE  DOLLAR. 

Persons  unused  to  calculate  the  possible  accumulative  value  of  a 
single  dollar,  at  work  in  the  economic  world  for  any  period  of  time, 
are  amazed  when  informed  that  the  possible  earning  capacity  of  one 
dollar  is  greater  than  that  of  an  ordinary  laborer. 

If  there  is  any  one  thing  in  which  the  ignorance  of  the  Afro- 
American  rules  supreme,  even  where  he  is  literate,  it  is  in  the  prin- 
ciples and  laws  governing  political  economy. 

You  would  scarcely  find  an  Afro-American  in  a day’s  journey,  who 
would  not  dispute  or  doubt  the  above  declaration  as  regards  the  earn- 
ing capacity  of  a dollar,  and  for  that  reason  he  gives  little,  or  no,  at- 
tention to  what  becomes  of  his  hard-earned  dollar,  beyond  supplying 
his  immediate  wants. 

He  only  looks  for,  and  sees,  the  pounds  of  groceries,  yards  of  dry 
goods,  pairs  of  shoes,  or  hats  that  come  into  his  possession  in  exchange 
for  his  money,  and  is  oblivious  of  the  fact  that  in  the  exchange  the 
profit  made  by  his  merchants  is  anywhere  from  25  per  cent  to  200  per 
cent,  in  which  are  bound  up  all  future  business  and  employment,  re- 
spectability and  power;  and  it  is  such  ignorance  that  accounts  for  his 
poverty,  helplessness,  and  continued  meniality  as  a race. 


RACE  IDEALS. 


4(i 


When  it  is  remembered  that  a dollar  in  an  active  business  com- 
munity may  change  hands,  or  pass  from  spender  to  receiver,  a dozen 
times,  or  more,  per  day,  and  earning  from  25. per  cent  upward  at  each 
exchange,  it  only  then  begins  to  dawn  upon  the  nebulous  brain  of  the 
benighted  Afro-American,  who  earned  that  dollar  and  was  its  first 
spender,  that  he  received  only  a passing  support  from  the  exchange, 
and  that  as  he  has  spent  it  in  a channel  where  he  and  members  of  his 
race  are  barred  from  employment  and  a marriage  portion,  all  the  prof- 
its and  advantages  which  his  dollar  will  continue  to  make  day  and 
night  will  be  on  the  white  man’s  side  of  the  ledger,  and  the  wealth, 
grandeur,  and  magnificence  which  its  accumulation  will  pile  up  for 
members  of  that  race,  contrasted  with  the  comparative  poverty  and 
degradation,  that  its  loss  must  entail  upon  members  of  his  race,  must 
go  on  disgracing  his  color  and  breeding  contempt  for  his  race. 

It  should  be  constantly  forced  upon  the  attention  of  the  Afro- 
American,  that  every  one,  who  handles  the  dollar  in  the  business  ex- 
change, makes  a profit,  or  is  supposed  to  make  a profit,  but  the  earner, 
and  that  if  he  spends  his  dollar  so  that  all  of  its  exchanges  will  be 
among  white  people,  then  all  of  the  accumulated  profits  that  it  must 
make  will  remain  with  that  race,  and  that  he  and  his  race  under  such 
a principle  are  occupying  the  same  position  that  his  grandfather  did 
seventy-five  years  ago — merely  existing  for  the  benefit  of  others. 

We  may  here  use  a concrete  illustration  of  the  operation  of  the 
economic  laws,  and  think  appropriately. 

The  dollar  which  the  laboring  man  earned  yesterday  he  spent 
for  groceries  before  breakfast  this  morning,  and  the  grocery  man,  who 
made  a profit  of  25  per  cent  in  the  exchange,  spent  it  in  a short  time 
with  the  coal  man,  on  which  exchange  he  made  25  per  cent.  The  coal 
man  soon  spent  the  same  dollar  with  the  milk  man,  on  which  he  made 
25  per  cent,  and  the  milk  man,  soon  after  it  came  into  his  possession, 
bought  dry  goods  of  a dry  goods  merchant,  on  which  he  made  30  per 
cent.  The  dry  goods  merchant  soon  spent  the  same  dollar  for  drugs, 
on  which  the  drug  man  made  75  per  cent,  who  in  turn  spent  it  in 
paying  the  lawyer,  who  made  50  per  cent,  who  in  turn  spent  it  in  a 
saloon,  on  which  exchange  the  saloon  man  made  75  per  cent,  aggre- 
gating in  the  seven  transactions  a gross  profit  of  305  per  cent ; and  as 
that  dollar  represents  in  all  probability  the  total  day’s  wages  of  the 
original,  this  proves  that  the  possible  earning  capacity  of  one  dollar  is 
greater  than  that  of  an  ordinary  laboring  man. 

To  get  some  idea  of  what  a community  of  Afro-Americans  are 
doing  for  others  and  against  themselves,  let  us  multiply  this  possible 
earning  capacity  of  one  dollar,  which  is  about  the  average  wages  of 


THE  REMEDY. 


47 


Afro-Americans  for  the  whole  country,  by  the  possible  earmng  capacity 
of  a thousand  of  that  class  for  one  day.  One  thousand  times  305  equals 
$3,050.00,  the  profit  on  the  one  thousand  dollars  paid  the  one  thous- 
and colored  laborers  for  their  one  day’s  work. 

At  least  40  per  cent  of  this  $3,050.00,  or  $1,220,  is  paid  out  to 
persons  employed  in  the  higher,  cleaner,  less  laborious,  and  better- 
paid  walks  of  life,  such  as  commercial  salesmen,  bookkeepers,  sten- 
ographers, typewriters,  etc.,  from  which  a slavish  custom  excludes  all 
black  people. 

Allowing  $1.50  per  day  for  this  higher  class  of  employees,  from 
which  the  Afro-American  is  barred,  it  is  seen  that  the  profit  which 
may  come  from  the  possible  earning  capacity  of  one  thousand  of  the 
latter  class  is  capable  of  employing  at  least  six  or  seven  hundred  of 
the  former,  after  allowing  for  the  other  running  expenses  and  net 
profits  of  the  business  men. 

Such  employees  constitute  a privileged  class,  when  compared  with 
the  Afro-American,  whose  economic  ignorance  prevents  him,  while 
feeling  the  effects,  from  knowing  the  results  of  his  own  acts,  and  causes 
him  to  wonder  why  God  has  so  ordained  things  that  he  is  always  con- 
fined io  the  hard,  poorly  paid,  menial  and  scavenger  service  of  the  com- 
munity, and  inclines  him  to  dispute  that  passage  of  Scripture  which 
says  that  “God  is  no  respecter  of  persons.” 

But  his  white  neighbor,  in  disbarring  him  from  advantageous  em- 
ployment, is  governed  by  a spirit  developed  in  the  same  training  which 
developed  a spirit  in  him  to  discriminate  against  himself  with  his 
labor,  patronage,  and  influence,  and  cannot  be  rightly  charged  with 
any  more  prejudice  against  him  than  he  has  against  himself. 

Both  the  spirit  of  the  white  man,  which  disbars  him,  as  well  as 
his  own  spirit,  which  discriminates  against  itself,  had  their  birth  and 
development  in  the  same  institution,  and  as  the  white  man  is  the 
gainer  and  he  is  the  loser,  as  the  results  of  the  acts  of  both  of  their 
spirits,  it  is  both  foolish  and  ridiculous  on  his  part  to  expect  the  white 
man  to  rid  himself  of  a baneful  spirit,  which  is  favorable  to  himself, 
sooner  than  he  rids  himself  of  a baneful  spirit  and  habits,  which  are 
harmful  to  him. 

But  these  thousand  dollars,  after  leaving  the  hands  of  the  Afro- 
American  laborers  in  their  various  ramifications  of  the  economic  world, 
finally  return  to  the  employers  of  those  thousand  men,  greatly  multi- 
plied, and  they  in  turn  each  one  again  is  paid  one  dollar,  leaving 
three  to  four  dollars  profit  on  the  ledger  of  the  employer  class  for 
each  employee,  out  of  which  they  pay  off  their  overseers,  superintend- 
ents. bookkeeper®,  typewriters,  etc.,  from  all  which  employments  the 


48 


RACE  IDEALS. 


Afro-American  is  again  barred  just  as  he  is  from  the  employment  made 
by  the  profits  from  his  purchases. 

Under  such  conditions,  when  the  Afro-American  discriminates 
against  himself  and  members  of  his  own  race,  with  his  labor  and  pat- 
ronage, he  becomes  the  greatest  assistant  to  members  of  the  white  race 
who  discriminates  against  him. 

No  wonder  that,  notwithstanding  the  loud  noise,  pratings,  and 
fulminations  about  his  material  advancement,  accumulation  of  wealth 
within  forty  years,  when  compared  with  that  of  the  white  race,  he  is 
poorer  to-day  than  he  was  when  emancipated. 

Even  now  we  think  that  we  can  hear  the  contemptuous  denial  of 
the  wiseacres,  but  we  have  the  statistics  at  hand  to  prove  every  word 
of  it,  however  much  we  wish  that  it  were  not  so. 

While  statistics  of  their  total  wealth,  by  which  comparisons  can 
be  made,  are  not  at  hand,  we  have  the  agricultural  statistics  of  two 
States,  covering  thirty  years,  by  which  comparisons  may  be  made,  and 
as  the  Afro-American  has  made  his  greater  progress  along  that  line, 
agricultural  statistics  will  show  him  off  to  the  best  advantage. 

At  the  beginning  of  his  period  of  freedom,  when  the  Afro-Amer- 
ican had  comparatively  nothing,  the  Federal  census  of  1870  shows  that 
the  agricultural  wealth  of  the  State  of  Georgia  was  $75,647,574  and 
that  of  South  Carolina  was  $35,847,010,  while  the  census  of  1900 
shows  the  total  agricultural  wealth  of  the  State  of  Georgia  to  be 
$183,370,120  and  that  of  South  Carolina  to  be  $126,761,430,  which 
shows  that  in  thirty  years  Georgia  gained  in  agricultural  wealth 
$107,722,546  and  South  Carolina  $90,914,520. 

Latest  statistics  show  the  total  wealth  of  Afro-Americans  in 
Georgia  to  be  about  $26,000,000,  and  the  total  wealth  of  that  race  in 
South  Carolina  to  be  about  $14,000,000,  which,  as  they  had  compar- 
atively nothing  in  1870,  was  gained  while  their  respective  States  were 
making  their  gains  in  agricultural  wealth. 

The  difference  between  $107,722,546  and  $26,000,000  and  $90.- 
914,520  and  $14,000,000  shows  how  much  richer  the  white  people  were 
than  the  colored  people  in  agricultural  wealth  alone  in  those  two 
States  in  1900  than  they  were  in  1870.  That  is,  the  white  people  of 
Georgia  were  $81,722,546,  and  those  of  South  Carolina  $76,914,520, 
richer  than  the  colored  people  of  their  respective  States  in  1900  than 
they  were  in  1870,  in  agricultural  wealth  alone. 

When  vou  add  to  those  totals,  the  white  man’s  percentage  of  gain 
financially,  in  commerce,  manufacture,  corporation,  and  citv  real  estate, 
where  it  is  much  greater  than  that  of  the  colored  man  than  it  is  in 
agriculture,  it  will  be  discovered  that  the  white  people  of  the  South 


% 


THE  REMEDY.  49 

were  more  than  twenty  times  richer  than  the  colored  people  in  1900 
than  they  were  in  1870,  which  accounts  for  the  apparently  growing 
str^igth  of  the  whites,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  very  apparently  grow- 
ing weakness  of  the  colored  people,  on  the  other. 

As  the  black  man  was  almost  absolutely  the  industrial  arm  of 
those  two  States  during  that  period,  and  produced  nearly  all  the  crude 
wealth  upon  which  the  white  people  made  such  wonderful  strides  in 
accumulation,  the  only  sane  reason  that  can  be  advanced  for  the  black 
man’s  failure  to  keep  pace  in  accumulation  with  the  white  man  is  his 
economic  ignorance,  and  the  control  of  those  customs  and  predisposi- 
tions, which  slavery  had  developed  in  him,  to  carry  all  his  labor,  pat- 
ronage, and  influence  to  the  white  race,  and  to  be  satisfied  in  turn 
with  whatever  little  morsel  it  should  choose  to  throw  at  him  to  keep 
his  soul  and  body  together  so  that  he  might  produce  more. 

Economic  ignorance  and  slavish  customs  keep  the  black  man  a 
beggar  and  dependent  in  communities  where  he  produces,  and  very 
nearly  consumes,  everything. 

Since  his  emancipation,  nothing  but  economic  ignorance  and  slav- 
ish feelings  and  customs  prevented  the  black  man  from  controlling 
the  business  and  owning  the  wealth  of  his  communities,  and  thereby 
preserving  his  life  and  citizenship. 

The  want  of  such  training,  as  would  enable  him  to  see  and  utilize 
all  his  powers  to  make  place,  standing,  and  protection  for  himself,  has 
made  the  educated  Afro-American  a laughing-stock,  for  the  reason 
that  after  he  has  spent  years  of  preparation  for  a higher  place  in  the 
economic  world,  unless  he  fills  some  professional  place  within  his  race, 
he  is  generally  forced  to  occupy  a place  within  the  ranks  of  the  illit- 
erate meniality  of  his  own  race,  because  those  who  trained  him  failed 
to  teach  him  two  very  important  facts: 

First,  that  all  the  avenues  to  higher  places,  in  the  economic  world, 
were  and  are  in  control  of  a people,  who  have  been  trained  to  feel  that, 
regardless  of  his  accomplishments  and  preparation,  he  is  out  of  place 
in  any  position  above  that  of  a menial  or  scavenger,  unless  it  is  filling 
some  professional  place  among  his  people,  considered  beneath  the  dig- 
nity of  a white  man. 

Secondly,  that  if  he  would  rise  above  a menial  and  carry  his  race 
up  with  him,  he  must  take  the  lead  in  teaching  them  how  to  utilize 
their  powers  to  make  places  for  themselves,  that  all  the  positions  in 
the  world  are  made  by  the  labor  and  patronage  of  the  masses,  and  that 
since  they  are  free,  they  have  it  within  their  power  to  make  themselves 
or  others,  but  for  want  of  consideration,  they  have  chosen  to  make 
others  instead  of  themselves. 


50 


RACE  IDEALS. 


Under  existing  habits  and  customs,  great  educational  preparation 
and  qualification  do  not  give  the  black  man  the  same  advantage  over 
the  unqualified  mass  of  his  race  in  the  economic  world  as  they  do  the 
white  man,  which  is  tending  to  discourage  both  himself  and  friends 
in  the  matter  of  his  higher  education. 

Of  course  such  customs  and  habits  are  outrageously  wrong  and 
unfair  to  colored  men,  because  those  who  control  the  economic  world 
gladly  receive  their  quota  to  sustain  it,  on  the  one  hand,  while  deny- 
ing them  their  share  of  resulting  benefits,  on  the  other. 

Under  such  conditions,  in  order  to  make  something  of  him  above 
a menial,  the  Afro-American  must  have  such  special  training  in  prac- 
tical political  economy  as  would  enable  him,  to  either  break  down  the 
barriers  to  his  entrance  and  employment  in  the  economic  world  in  gen- 
eral, or  to  establish  an  independent  economic  system  of  his  own,  in 
which  he  and  his  progeny  will  have  place  and  opportunity  to  display 
their  economic  prowess,  prove  their  commercial  equality  as  they  have 
their  industrial,  and  enjoy  the  resulting  fruits  of  their  labor. 

But  the  question  of  giving  the  Afro-American  the  needed  special 
training  necessary  to  fit  him  for  his  place  in  the  economic  world  brings 
us  face  to  face  with  an  educational  paradox. 

As  the  Afro-American  is  being  trained  in  an  educational  system, 
established  and  developed  for  a people  not  in  need  of  such  special 
training  as  he  requires  and  must  have  if  he  is  ever  to  be  anything 
but  a menial,  he  is  handicapped  and  must  go  on  producing  tools  and 
educated  slaves,  or  so  amend  the  present  system  as  to  make  it  meet 
his  needs. 

Such  a system  of  special  training  would  not  only  enable  him  to 
speedily  build  up  very  large  and  influential  industrial,  commercial, 
and  financial  enterprises,  furnishing  him  with  an  opportunity  to  se- 
cure the  honors  and  emoluments  connected  with  all  human  affairs,  and 
leaving  the  profits  on  his  side  of  the  ledger,  thereby  increasing  his 
wealth  and  reducing  his  poverty  by  a thousand  fold,  but  would  at  the 
same  time,  and  in  the  same  proportion  that  he  increased  his  wealth 
and  influence,  break  down  the  barriers  which  bar  him  from  employ- 
ment in  the  economic  world  in  general,  by  associating  his  color  with 
positions  and  places  in  the  world’s  affairs,  which  would  finally  make 
it  a badge  of  honor,  instead  of  the  badge  of  dishonor  that  it  now  is 
because  it  only  represents  meniality  and  low  and  dirty  employment  and 
conditions. 

Because  he  is  still  controlled  by  his  old  plantation  training  to 
carry  all  of  his  production  and  patronage  to  “the  big  house,”  to  the 
white  man,  and  thereby  still  makes  his  community  like  the  old  Negro 


TEE  REMEDY. 


51 


quarters,  when  compared  with  that  of  his  white  neighbors,  the  poor- 
est, lowest,  and  dirtiest  in  the  city,  the  present  movement  of  Afro- 
Americans  to  large  centers  of  population  is  to  be  deplored,  until  they 
are  trained  to  use  their  resources  to  make  their  community  just  what 
every  other  special  element  of  the  cosmopolitan  population  makes  of 
its  community. 

Slavery  was  clearly  in  violation  of  all  moral  and  religious  laws, 
and,  wherever  established,  commits  a breach  in  every  other  law. 

The  American  system  of  slavery  so  trained  and  accustomed  its 
victims  to  such  breaches  that  they  make  the  same  effort  to  sustain  and 
maintain  unnatural  and  unjust  laws  and  rules,  even  when  injurious 
to  themselves,  that  other  people  make  to  sustain  them  when  favorable 
to  themselves. 

If  the  Afro-American  were  properly  trained,  in  time  his  freedom 
of  employment  and  the  proper  disposition  of  his  production  and  pat- 
ronage would  mend  such  breaches,  and  correct  all  the  evils  from  which 
he  now  suffers  on  account  of  them. 

But  the  fact  that  the  white  American  is  benefited  rather  than  in- 
juriously affected  by  such  breaches,  and  does  not  need  any  special 
training  to  cause  him  to  protect  himself,  puts  the  hlack  American,  who 
vitally  requires  such  training,  in  a class  by  himself,  and  really  creates 
the  necessity  for  separate  schools,  if  he  is  ever  to  be  properly  developed. 

In  a system  of  education,  designed  to  meet  his  special  require- 
ments, first  of  all  the  Afro-American  student  would  be  specially  taught 
how  to  spend  his  labor,  patronage,  energy,  and  influence  to  make  the 
most  of  himself. 

While  being  trained  in  literary,  mechanical,  and  industrial  lines, 
he  would  be  thoroughly  drilled  in  the  principles  of  theoretical  and 
practical  political  economy,  as  applied  to  himself  in  his  peculiar  sit- 
uation, so  that  he  would  not  only  understand  where  and  how  best  to 
spend  his  labor  and  patronage,  but  how  to  calculate  the  value  of  his 
services  to  himself  as  well  as  his  employer,  his  patronage  to  himself  as 
well  as  the  party  patronized,  to  the  end  that  he  might  dispose  of  them 
in  the  way  best  calculated  to  advance  the  cause  of  himself  and 
progeny. 

He  would  be  taught  that,  owing  to  the  peculiar  position  in  which 
slavery  placed  him  in  the  economic  world,  unlike  all  other  classes  in 
the  community,  he  is  almost  entirely  cut  off  from  the  resulting  benefits 
of  his  productions  and  consumptions  and  that  he  must  learn  to  so  use 
them  as  to  secure  the  same  benefits,  in  every  respect,  that  others  get. 

He  would  be  taught  that,  in  order  to  have  his  race  attain  an  equal 
place  in  the  family  of  races,  he  must  dispose  of  his  productions  and 


52 


RACE  IDEALS. 


consumptions,  not  only  with  a view  to  getting  the  most  out  of  them 
now  and  individually  a principle  advocated  by  shallow  theories,  but 
he  must  dispose  of  them  with  the  special  design,  even  at  a sacrifice  of 
some  small  portion  of  present  values,  to  benefit  and  build  up  his  ex- 
cluded and  proscribed  race,  which  would  result  in  everlastingly  bene- 
fiting himself  and  progeny  as  a part  of  the  race. 

In  such  a system  of  training,  he  would  be  taught  all  the  peculiari- 
ties of  members  of  his  race,  and  the  means  used  to  develop  such  pecu- 
liarities, and  on  account  of  which  all  the  hardships  and  delicacies  in- 
volved in  their  dealings  with  each  other,  how  their  training  for  cent- 
uries has  developed  in  them  a feeling  that  it  is  a disgrace  to  serve 
each  other,  to  look  upon  each  other  with  the  same  feeling  of  contempt 
with  which  members  of  the  white  race  are  governed,  and  to  have  a want 
of  confidence  in  each  other  in  every  respect,  and  what  diplomacy  to 
employ,  and  how  to  use  it,  to  overcome  such  unnatural  feelings  and 
prejudices. 

He  would  not  only  be  taught  how  to  save  money,  but  the  more 
important  fact  of  how  to  use  it  wisely;  that  the  custom  of  members 
of  his  race,  inexperienced  in  business,  of  putting  a dollar  at  the  end  of 
the  week  in  a savings  bank,  on  which  they  are  promised  3 per  cent 
annually,  that  a member  of  the  economically  trained  class  borrows 
from  the  bank  on  the  following  Monday  and  so  employs  it  that  mem- 
bers of  his  race  pay  more  than  100  per  cent  a week  for  its  use,  is  not 
wise. 

In  short,  he  would  be  taught  in  such  a special  system  of  train- 
ing that  not  only  his  present  want  is  involved  in  the  expenditure  of 
his  labor,  patronage,  and  influence,  but  all  higher  order  of  employ- 
ment, wealth,  marriage  portion,  political  and  social  standing  are  in- 
volved as  well,  and  inspired  to  so  use  his  powers  and  opportunities, 
whether  industrial,  commercial,  financial,  or  political,  as  to  broadly 
advance  his  cause. 

Such  a system  of  training  for  Afro-Americans  is  vitally  needed, 
as  a matter  of  self-preservation  for  that  race. 

Its  necessity  is  forced  upon  the  Afro-American  without  any  wish 
of  his,  and  does  not  involve  any  hatred,  or  desire  of  exclusiveness,  but 
is  forced  on  him  by  the  custom  of  excluding  him  from  all  honorable 
share  and  participation  in  the  honors  and  emoluments  of  an  economic 
system,  to  the  building  of  which  he  is  contributing  his  share. 

Economic  ignorance  and  that  destructive  spirit  which  long  years 
of  training  has  developed  in  the  race  to  discriminate  against  itself, 
have  enabled  the  outcast  Jew,  German,  Irishman,  Italian,  and  other 
nationalities  to  locate  near  or  within  the  communitv  of  Afro-Ameri- 


THE  REMEDY. 


53 


cans  and  in  a short  time  be  made  respectable  enough  to  be  received  by 
the  proudest  members  of  their  race  as  well  as  others. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  period  of  emancipation,  the  Jew  had 
little  or  no  standing  in  this  country,  and  in  the  South  the  German, 
Irish,  and  Italian  were  not  much  better  off,  but  when  the  black  man 
was  freed  from  his  physical  slavery  to  one  master,  by  reason  of  his 
training,  he  became  the  economic  slave  of  many  white  masters,  espe- 
cially those  who  possessed  the  diplomacy  to  flatter  him  and  cater  to 
his  fanciful  and  child-like  notions  of  life. 

The  Jews  and  Germans  especially  have  proven  themselves  past 
masters  in  the  art  of  flattering  and  patting  the  brother  in  black  on  the 
back,  and  in  consequence  he  has  made  millions  of  Jews  and  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  Germans  rich,  independent,  and  respectable. 

He  has  given  the  Jews  such  a lift  that  that  race  is  very  nearly 
controlling  the  commercial  welfare  of  this  nation,  and  is  being  more 
and  more  accorded  its  equality  in  the  social  realm. 

To  the  same  extent  that  he  has  made  the  Jews,  Germans,  and  oth- 
ers rich  and  respectable,  he  has  made  himself  poor  and  disreputable. 

For  every  rich  Jew,  German,  Irishman,  or  Italian  that  he  has 
made,  he  has  correspondingly  made  a poor  member  of  his  own  race, 
and  if  the  hundreds  of  thousands  of  members  of  other  races  whom  he 
has  made  rich,  influential,  and  respectable  were  members  of  his  own 
race,  there  would  be  no  “Jim  Crow”  and  disfranchising  legislation  in 
this  country. 

Such  legislation  is  made  possible  only  through  his  discrimination 
against  himself,  which  is  everywhere  making  him  most  disreputable 
and  weakest,  where  he  ought  to  be  most  respectable  and  strongest. 

It  is  his  discrimination  against  himself  that  makes  a Tillman,  or 
Vardaman,  possible. 

If  it  were  not  for  his  discrimination  against  himself,  he  would 
to-day  have  an  uninterrupted  entrance  to  the  ballot-box  all  over  the 
land,  and  would  not  only  be  fully  represented  in  his  local  State  govern- 
ments, but  would  have  anywhere  from  twenty-five  to  forty  represent- 
atives in  the  lower  branch  of  Congress,  and  eight  or  ten  in  the  United 
States  Senate,  besides  being  accredited  with  hundreds  of  representa- 
tives to  foreign  governments. 

Economic  ignorance  is  causing  the  Afro-American  minister  to  use 
the  resources  'given  by  his  congregation  for  his  support  to  aid  in  the 
support  of  his  white  brother  minister,  by  leaving  the  profits  made  from 
his  patronage  among  his  communicants  instead  of  his  own;  is  causing 
the  colored  lawyer  to  build  up  his  rival  instead  of  himself,  by  spend- 
ing the  fees  collected  from  his  clientele  among  the  clientele  of  his 


54 


RACE  IDEALS. 


■white  rival ; is  causing  the  Afro-American  physician  to  aid  in  the  sup- 
port of  his  white  rival,  by  leaving  the  profits  from  his  patronage 
among  his  patients  instead  of  his  own. 

The  Afro-American  is  greatly  flattered  and  lulled  into  peaceful 
security  by  the  fulminations  of  his  orators  concerning  his  achieve- 
ments, especially  along  material  lines,  within  forty  years. 

While  it  is  true  that  he  is  entitled  to  much  credit  for  what  he  has 
done,  it  ought  to  be  used  to  stimulate  him  to  greater  activity  by  also 
pointing  out  the  many  things,  at  the  same  time,  that  he  has  failed  to 
do,  instead  of  lulling  him  into  peaceful  security  and  self-satisfaction, 
by  creating  a feeling  that  he  nas  done  all  that  was  possible  under  the 
circumstances. 

Any  student  of  conditions  knows  that,  with  his  physical  and  in- 
dustrial developments  and  the  frugal  manner  in  which  he  had  been 
trained  to  live,  had  it  not  been  for  his  destructive  spiritual  and  eco- 
nomic development,  he  would  have  accomplished  more  materially  in 
five  years  after  his  physical  emancipation  than  he  has  during  its  en- 
tire period. 

Even  including  him  as  property  value,  the  white  South  is  more 
than  twice  as  wealthy  as  it  was  fifty  years  ago,  and  twenty  times  more 
wealthy  than  he,  than  it  was  when  he  was  emancipated.  That  is,  de- 
ducting what  he  has  amassed  from  the  present  wealth  of  the  white 
South  will  demonstrate  that  it  is  twenty  times  wealthier  than  he  is 
now  than  it  was  then. 

We  presume  that  there  will  be  no  question  as  to  the  fact  that  the 
Afro-American  is  proportionately  as  great  a producing  and  consuming 
element  as  there  is  in  the  country,  and  as  such  must  be  credited  with 
his  proportion  of  its  commerce,  both  domestic  and  foreign. 

According  to  the  Federal  treasury  statistics  some  four  or  five 
years  since,  the  foreign  commerce  of  this  nation  amounted  to  more  than 
$3,200,000,000  annually,  and  political  economists  say  that  the  domes- 
tic commerce  of  a nation  is  ten  times  as  great  as  its  foreign;  there- 
fore the  domestic  commerce  must  have  been  $32,000,000,000  at  the 
same  time. 

Since  the  Afro-American  constitutes  about  12  per  cent  of  the  pop- 
ulation, he  is  entitled  to  be  credited  with  12  per  cent  of  the  commerce 
of  the  nation.  12  per  cent  of  $3,200,000,000  is  $384,000,000,  which 
represents  the  foreign  commerce  of  the  Afro-American  race;  and  12 
per  cent  of  $32,200,000,000  is  $3,840,000,000,  representing  the  total 
amount  of  his  domestic  commerce  annually ; and  his  total  annual  com- 
merce would  be  $4,224,000,000. 

25  per  cent  (the  usual  gross  profit)  of  that  sum  is  $1,056,000,000, 


THE  REMEDY. 


55 


the  sum  that  he  should  have  had  to  distribute  in  wages  and  add  to 
his  wealth  annually. 

In  all  sound  business  dealings  the  net  profit  is  about  25  per  cent 
of  the  gross,  which  would  annually  add  $264,000,000  to  the  wealth 
of  that  race. 

According  to  the  census  of  1900,  the  Afro-American  race  had 
amassed  a total  wealth  of  only  about  $700,000,000,  including  what  the 
members  of  that  race  had  previous  to  emancipation,  and  if  its  annual 
accumulations  had  been  even  half  of  the  amount  that  it  should  have 
amassed,  its  total  wealth  would  have  been  $4,620,000,000,  instead  of 
$700,000,000.  , i 

All  this  loss  was  entailed  for  want  of  proper  spiritual  and  eco- 
nomic development. 

Secondly,  let  us  deal  with  the  restoration  of  race  ideals  and  the 
rehabilitation  of  the  spiritual  man,  which  are  so  intimately  allied  that 
you  cannot  help  one  without  aiding  the  other,  for  the  race  was  not 
spiritually  degraded  until  deprived  of  its  ideals. 

The  race  lost  its  ideals  in  being  constantly  and  exclusively  fed, 
both  through  its  eyes  and  mind,  with  white  human  ideals,  standards, 
and  models  for  three  hundred  years,  the  period  during  which  it  was 
deprived  of  ideal  characters  within  itself,  and  a restoration  of  its  ideals 
can  only  be  brought  about  by  reversing  conditions. 

The  Afro-Americans  must  learn  the  spiritual  effect  of  pictures, 
paintings,  and  living  models  on  man  in  general,  and  after  which  be 
taught  to  substitute  pictures,  paintings,  and  living  models  of  their  own 
race  for  those  of  the  white  race  as  a means  of  restoring  lost  ideals. 

The  Afro-American  parent  should  be  made  to  realize  that  the 
work  of  developing  a white  spirit  in  a black  body  commences  with 
placing  the  white  artistic  doll  model  in  the  hands  of  his  infant  in  the 
cradle,  is  enlarged  upon  in  lining  bis  walls  with  the  pictures  and 
paintings  of  members  of  the  white  race,  and  is  continued  in  the  schools 
in  the  use  of  books  with  white  pictures  and  models  exclusively,  and 
ends  in  the  final  result  in  producing  a being  which  is  ashamed  of  its 
color  and  despises  the  race  with  which  it  is  connected. 

It  is  apparent  to  students  of  humanity  that  the  Afro-American 
race  is  spiritually  defective,  as  the  result  of  man’s  art,  and  not  the 
work  of  Nature’s  God,  as  its  slanderers  and  traducers  would  have  us 
believe,  and  any  system  of  education  provided  for  members  of  that 
race  which  does  not  especially  plan  for  the  spiritual  development  of 
its  youth,  to  say  the  least,  is  very  deficient. 

As  our  system  of  education  does  not  provide  for  the  spiritual  as 
well  as  the  mechanical  and  intellectual  development  of  the  Afro-Amer- 


56 


RACE  IDEALS. 


ican’s  composite  man,  so  far  as  his  necessities  are  concerned,  it  is  un- 
scientific, and,  until  properly  amended,  must  continue  to  fail  to  pro- 
duce in  him  the  state  of  being  necessary  to  properly  sustain  itself  in 
this  country. 

A system  of  education  properly  designed  to  meet  his  necessities 
would  be  divided  into  four  branches,  physical,  mechanical,  intellectual, 
and  spiritual,  with  especial  emphasis  placed  on  the  latter,  as  he  is 
most  deficient  in  that. 

Of  the  trinity,  mechanical,  intellectual,  and  spiritual  man,  the 

latter,  which  is  the  master  and  ruler,  is  the  most  important  and  vital, 
and  as  environment,  long  years  of  adverse  training,  and  traditions 
have  developed  and  minimized  the  Afro-American’s  spiritual  man,  it 
should  have  first  consideration  in  a plan  of  education  devised  for  his 
development. 

As  it  is  now,  his  youth,  with  too  little  ego,  is  placed  in  the  same 
system  as  the  youth  of  the  white  race,  some  of  which  have  too  much 
ego.  No  amount  of  mechanical,  or  intellectual,  training,  or  wealth,  can 
make  up  for  a disparity  in  spiritual  equality,  and  it  is  the  duty  of  the 
State,  especially  where  its  government  provides  for  equality  of  citizen- 
ship, to  provide  such  a system  of  training  for  its  youth  as  would  de- 
crease a magnified  ego,  and  increase  a minimized  ego,  to  the  end  of  es- 
tablishing a spiritual  equality  in  its  population,  by  which  it  would  se- 
cure a harmonious  citizenship  and  insure  a reign  of  justice,  peace,  and 
happiness. 

Our  present  system  is  constantly  increasing  the  opposite  effect. 

As  the  spirit  of  the  Afro-American  has  been  dwarfed,  his  ideals 
have  been  destroyed  and  his  ego  minimized  by  years  of  depression  and 
oppression,  leaving  him  in  an  environment  and  atmosphere  where  it 
is  next  to  impossble  for  him  unaided  to  restore  normal  traditions,  and 
develop  means  to  overcome  centuries  of  bad  training,  all  plans  for  his 
rehabilitation  should  have  in  the  very  beginning,  been  laid  with  a view 
to  restoring  him  to  a normal  spiritual  state. 

An  element  of  the  white  race,  ascribing  his  spiritual  degradation 
tc  the  work  of  Nature  instead  of  the  art  of  man,  has  never  ceased  to 
cry,  in  and  out  of  season,  that  no  amount  of  education  can  make  a 
white  man  out  of  a Negro,  can  elevate  the  latter  to  a plane  of  equality 
with  the  former,  while  his  friends,  who  are  pushing  the  work  of  his 
mechanical,  intellectual,  moral,  and  religious  development  at  the  cost 
of  his  spiritual,  have  failed  to  realize  their  fondest  hopes  in  his  de- 
velopment, and  are  confused. 

Pursuing  such  unscientific  methods  for  three  decades,  and  failing 
in  their  cherished  hopes,  bis  friends  commenced  withdrawing  their 


THE  REMEDY. 


ot 

means  and  support  from  institutions  for  his  intellectual  development, 
and  have  been  since  concentrating  everything  on  institutions  for  his 
industrial  and  mechanical  development,  at  the  cost  of  both  his  intel- 
lectual and  spiritual  development,  which  is  a still  greater  blunder. 

When  the  Afro-American  commences  to  think  originally,  he  will 
impress  upon  the  attention  of  those  in  control  of  educational  affairs, 
the  great  injustice  and  spiritual  harm  done  his  offspring  in  excluding 
proper  models  and  ideals  of  his  race  from  the  books  and  educational 
plans,  in  which  it  is  being  trained. 

As  an  important  means  of  aiding  in  the  spiritual  development  of 
his  offspring,  the  Afro-American  should  line  his  walls,  mantels,  and 
libraries  with  the  paintings,  pictures,  and  models  of  Toussaint  L’Ouver- 
ture,  Edward  W.  Blyden,  the  elder  and  younger  Dumas,  Frederick 
Douglass,  Benjamin  Bannicker,  Thillis  Wheatley,  Emperor  Menelik, 
Pushkin,  Paul  Laurence  Dunbar,  etc.,  and  so  post  himself  on  their 
histories  that  when  his  offspring  point  to  Douglass  and  demand  to 
know  who  he  was,  he  would  be  able  to  tell  his  little  ones,  when  their 
questions  prove  that  their  inquiring  minds  are  ready  for  the  lessons, 
that  he  was  a member  of  their  race,  who,  born  and  nearly  reared  a 
slave,  ran  away  and  fo\md  freedom  in  the  Northern  States,  where  he 
was*  taken  up  by  some  friends  and  sent  to  school,  and  finally  developed 
into  a wonderful  orator,  holding  two  continents  in  awe  with  the  spell 
of  his  eloquence,  and  very  largely  assisted  in  battering  down  the  walls 
of  slavery  with  his  oratorical  powers. 

When  they  point  to  Benjamin  Banniker  and  inquire  to  know 
something  of  him,  or  his  history,  the  parent  should  be  able  to  say: 
“My  children,  he  was  a contemporary  of  George  Washington  and 
Thomas  Jefferson.  He  became  a great  geometrician,  and  made  the  first 
wooden  clock  and  almanac  ever  made  on  this  continent.  Thomas  Jef- 
ferson was  so  proud  of  his  calendar  and  thought  so  much  of  its  merits 
that  he  sent  a copy  of  it,  in  vindication  of  the  possibilities  of  the 
abilities  of  the  race,  to  the  Academy  of  the  Sciences  in  Paris,  and 
Washington  called  him  to  his  aid  when  assuming  the  responsibilities 
of  laying  out  the  capital  of  the  Nation,  which  bears  his  name.” 

Tell  them  that  Phillis  Wheatley  was  a little  African  waif,  stolen 
away  from  her  native  land  at  the  age  of  seven  years;  that  she  was 
bought  in  Boston  in  a slave  mart,  by  a kind  mistress,  who  permitted 
her  to  study  with  her  own  daughters,  and  at  the  age  of  sixteen  she  had 
not  only  mastered  English,  Greek,  and  Latin,  but  had  developed  into 
probably  the  greatest  poetess  in  America;  that  she  addressed,  to  George 
Washington,  a heroic  poem,  in  his  honor,  while  he  was  encamped  at 


58 


RACE  IDEALS. 


Cambridge,  in  token  of  which  he  sent  her  a very  appreciative  reply, 
addressing  her  as  “Miss  Phillis.” 

Tell  them  that  Toussaint  L’Ouverture  was  a member  of  their  race, 
and  though  born  and  reared  to  manhood  a slave,  that  after  maturity 
he  organized  his  black  brothers  into  a thunderbolt,  which  he  hurled  at 
the  master  class,  drove  it  away  from  the  island  of  Haiti,  and  declared 
the  freedom  of  his  race;  and  that  he  established  the  government  of 
Haiti,  which  has  come  down  as  a governmental  wonder  to  our  day; 
that  he  made  the  first  rift  in  the  cloud  of  gloom  which  had  obscured 
the  sky  of  the  race  throughout  the  Western  hemisphere,  and  by  the 
light  produced  through  the  rift  by  his  star  Queen  Victoria  saw  how 
to  write  the  ediet  freeing  all  the  slaves  in  her  dominion  and  Abraham 
Lincoln  saw  how  to  write  and  issue  his  Emancipation  Proclamation. 
Wendell  Phillips  said,  in  summing  up  his  great  virtues:  “I  would 

compare  him  to  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  but  that  monarch  rose  to  his 
throne  through  seas  of  blood  and  over  mountains  of  broken  oaths;  this 
Negro  never  spilt  innocent  blood  nor  broke  his  oath.  I would  com- 
pare him  to  Cromwell  of  England,  but  that  monarch  established  a gov- 
ernment which  fell  to  pieces  immediately  after  his  death;  this  Negro 
established  a government  which  has  come  down  to  our  day.  I would 
compare  him  to  Washington,  but  the  Virginian  held  slaves,  while  this 
Negro  risked  his  whole  empire  rather  than  permit  the  humblest  per- 
son in  it  to  be  a slave.”  And  in  his  matchless  peroration  he  declared : 
“Fifty  years  lieuce,  when  truth  gets  a hearing  and  men  will  write  his- 
tory in  truth  and  not  with  their  prejudices,  the  Muse  of  history  will 
place  Phocion  as  the  greatest  man  of  Greece,  Brutus  for  Rome,  La- 
fayette for  France,  and  Hampden  for  England,  and  she  will  select 
Washington  as  the  flower  of  our  earlier  civilization  and  John  Brown 
as  the  ripe  fruit  of  our  mature  years;  then,  turning,  she  will  dip  her 
pen  in  the  sunlight  and  write  in  the  clear  blue  above  them  all  the 
name  of  the  soldier,  the  statesman,  the  hero,  the  martyT,  Toussaint 
L’Ouverture.”  Who,  with  Menelik,  is  a faint  harbinger  of  succeeding 
generations. 

After  once  exciting  the  children’s  interest  in  such  great  race 
models  and  ideals,  fill  your  libraries  with  their  histories,  and  with 
such  fertilizing  you  will  see  pride  of  race  and  ambition  and  aspira- 
tion grow  under  your  very  eyes;  for  in  reading  the  history  of  their 
race  they  will  find  ideal  characters  in  every  line. 

But  all  these  achievements  were  made  during  last  the  five  hun- 
dred years,  under  very  oppressive  and  depressing  circumstances,  dur- 
ing which,  and  as  a justification  for  reducing  them  to  slavery,  eco- 
nomic tools,  the  most  irreligious  and  brazen  efforts  have  not  only  been 


THE  REMEDY. 


59 


made  to  brutalize  and  assign  the  children  of  Ham  to  legalized  igno- 
rance, but  to  outlaw  them  in  human  society  in  general,  and  as  such 
in  general  these  great  models  had  to  steal  their  knowledge  of  letters; 
and,  in  defense  of  the  accursed  institution  and  contrary  to  the  Holy 
Scriptures,  strenuous  efforts  have  been  made,  which  have  not  even  yet 
ceased,  to  deprive  them  of  their  heirship  in  the  glorious  and  matchless 
history  of  Ethiopia,  the  fountain  from  which  all  civilization  sprung. 

In  this  age,  when  the  efficacy  of  the  religion  of  our  Lord  and 
Savior  Jesus  has  thrown  open  the  doors  of  knowledge  to  the  long- 
excluded  sons  of  Ethiopia,  should  it  appear  that  those  models  and 
ideals  do  not  raise  the  standard  sufficiently  high  for  the  more  en- 
lightened souls  of  the  Afro-American  youth,  using  all  the  latter-day 
achievements  of  members  of  the  white  race  as  mere  rounds  in  the  lad- 
der of  civilization,  and  ascending  with  them  on  this  to  where  it  termi- 
nates amid  the  dizzy  heights  attained  by  their  grandsires;  there  among 
the  clouds,  where  their  ancestors  talked  with  the  gods,  call  up  the 
shades  of  their  grandsire  Ham  and  his  three  sons,  Mizraim,  Phut, 
and  Cush,  of  whom  those  constituting  the  various  rounds  of  the  lad- 
der of  civilization  on  which  you  have  ascended  are  mere  disciples, 
and  poor  ones  at  that,  or  we  would  not  have  any  lost  arts. 

Ask  the  old  forefather  cf  the  race.  Ham,  who  among  his  illus- 
trious sons  did  most  for  the  advancement  of  the  world’s  civilization? 

With  a frown,  coupled  with  reproachful  words,  and  yet  with  some 
degree  of  pride,  we  imagine  that  he  would  commend  all  his  sons  for 
their  mighty  achievements,  and  condemn  them  for  that  pride,  arro- 
gance, and  godlessness  which  brought  on  their  fall  and  entailed  so 
much  misery  on  his  progeny. 

But  with  great  pride  he  would  point  to  his  descendants  as  the 
builders  of  Ethiopia,  Chaldea,  Babylonia,  Phoenicia,  and  Egypt,  as  the 
race  which  developed  and  gave  the  world  its  civilization,  its  knowledge 
of  emblems  and  letters  as  means  of  communicating  ideas,  its  science 
of  navigation  as  the  means  of  sailing  unknown  seas,  its  knowledge  of 
agriculture  as  the  base  of  existence,  its  knowledge  of  commerce  and 
use  of  money  as  means  of  exchanging  products  and  values — in  short, 
its  science  of  government,  mathematics,  astronomy,  astrology,  and  its 
arts  ; and  there  in  the  midst  of  those  mighty  builders,  your  children 
could  choose  such  models  and  ideals  as  would  satisfy  their  highest 
aspirations. 

Old  father  Ham  would  doubtless  improve  the  opportunity  to  give 
his  Afro-American  descendants  some  much-needed  instruction,  and  to 
deliver  some  great  prophecies.  He  would  remind  them  that  while  a 
tropical  sun  had  darkened  their  complexion  and  crisped  their  hair, 


60 


RACE  IDEALS. 


there  was  a time  when  the  different  shades  of  complexion  among  men 
meant  no  more  than  the  different  hues  or  tints  in  the  same  species  of 
the  animal  kingdom;  that  God  had  given  their  race  the  most  pro- 
ductive and  prosperous  part  of  the  globe,  a part  of  the  earth  in  which 
life  can  be  maintained  easier  than  anywhere  else,  and  that  their  color 
was  disgraced  by  the  low  economic  condition  which  it  has  been  forced 
to  occupy  during  the  past  five  hundred  years,  and  that  their  freedom 
had  given  them  an  opportunity  to  wipe  off  the  disgrace  by  changing 
the  condition;  that  if  the  economic  condition  of  the  son  of  Japheth  or 
Shem,  when  compared  with  theirs,  were  reversed,  in  time  the  same 
unpopularity  would  attach  to  their  hue,  as  man  is  given  to  associate 
everything  with  condition. 

He  would  go  further  in  saying  to  the  American  branch  of  his 
descendants,  that  they  can  only  change  the  unpopularity  of  their  hue, 
by  changing  the  environments  and  conditions,  which  disgrace  it;  that 
their  very  foolish  and  ridiculous  disposition  to  be  ashamed  of  their 
color,  was  proving  their  greatest  barrier  in  efforts  to  change  the  very 
undesirable  conditions,  which  disgrace  their  color;  that  they  have  all 
the  elements  of  success  except  that  degree  of  pride  which  draws  the 
members  of  other  races,  with  their  resources  and  patronage,  to  them- 
selves; that  their  proper  pride  went  with  the  transference  of  their 
ideals,  and  can  only  be  regained  with  their  restoration;  and  for  that 
reason  the  restoration  of  their  ideals  is  of  primary  importance;  and 
that  their  proportional  production  and  consumption,  the  elemental 
groundwork  of  success,  are  as  great  as  those  of  any  other  element  of 
the  American  population,  and  that  nothing  stands  in  the  way  of  their 
success  except  the  want  of  cohesion  and  sympathy,  which  is  superin- 
duced bv  white  ideals  and  economic  ignorance,  on  account  of  which  all 
their  institutions  are  perishing  for  want  of  the  aid,  which  they  are 
foolishly  throwing  away  on  the  institutions  of  others,  in  which  they 
are  barred  from  every  advantage. 

He  would  remind  them  that  the  hope  of  their  brothers  in  a state 
of  natural  freedom  in  the  fatherland,  who  have  never  lost  their  ideals 
and  pride  of  race,  is  greater  than  theirs. 

He  would  declare  that  while  atoning  for  the  sins  of  their  proud 
and  godless  forefathers,  they  had  paid  penance  for  many  centuries,  but 
the  Great  Spirit  of  the  Universe,  who  had  delivered  the  keys  of  knowl- 
edge originally  to  his  line,  had  not  wholly  forsaken  them ; that  during 
their  entire  period  of  penance,  while  temporarily  deprived  of  the  keys 
of  knowledge,  He  had  preserved  their  fatherland  from  usurpation  and 
occupation  by  the  sons  of  Japheth  and  Shem,  through  ignorance  and 
desert  walls,  until  now,  when  the  time  is  ripe  for  their  deliverance,  He 


THE  REMEDY. 


Cl 


is  using  their  greed  and  avarieiousness  to  restore  the  keys;  that  when 
the  keys  of  knowledge  are  fully  restored  to  their  race,  they  will  find 
new  depths  in  the  Pierian  springs  of  knowledge  and  flood  the  world 
with  new  light,  giving  it  a higher  and  grander  civilization,  in  which 
the  fatherhood  of  God  and  the  brotherhood  of  man  will  have  a broader 
application  in  a nobler  field  of  Christian  brotherhood. 

He  would  declare  that  his  descendants,  in  extending  the  arm  of 
protection  to  the  child  Jesus  when  His  life  was  sought  by  Herod,  a 
wicked  son  of  Shem,  and  in  their  carrying  his  cross  through  Simon, 
one  of  their  number,  when  His  human  nature  fainted  and  fell,  while 
Asia,  through  the  sons  of  Shem,  cried  for  his  blood,  and  Europe, 
through  the  sons  of  Japheth,  nailed  Him  to  the  cross,  had  done  much 
to  shorten  their  night  of  gloom;  for  even  now  a scrutinizing  glance 
over  the  hilltops  of  the  east,  or  west,  will  reveal  the  glow  of  a rising 
sun,  which  will  soon  flood  their  world  with  light. 

Finally,  as  a means  of  assisting  in  the  restoration  of  their  ideals, 
he  would  urge  them  to  industriously  apply  themselves  to  the  task  of 
collecting  and  studying  the  remaining  historical  and  monumental 
fragments  of  the  grand  age  of  their  race,  which  time  has  not  effaced 
and  the  avaricious  and  ambitious  sons  of  Shem  and  Japheth  have  not 
appropriated  to  themselves. 


Pabt  IV. 


HISTORICAL  EXTRACTS. 

Both,  as  a means  of  sustaining  the  historical  position  assumed  in 
this  treatise,  as  well  as  a means  of  furnishing  students  of  race  history 
with  some  data  that  may  aid  in  their  researches,  we  have  drawn  as 
follows  upon  some  of  the  world’s  most  renowned  and  authentic  his- 
torians, with  references. 

During  the  last  five  hundred  years,  in  which  the  greed  and  selfish- 
ness of  a part  of  the  white  race  impelled  its  members  to  reduce  their 
brothers  in  black  to  slavery,  they  have  ransacked  every  department 
of  anatomy  arid  physiology  to  find  an  anatomical  or  physiological  dif- 
ference between  the  physically  black  and  white  man,  on  which  to  rest 
the  claim  that  the  former  is  less  than  man,  and  so  square  their  con- 
science with  the  requirements  of  the  New  Testament  in  vindication 
of  the  accursed  institution. 

Having  failed  in  all  their  laborious  efforts  to  find  a physical  or 
natural  difference,  they  finally  based  their  claims  of  superiority  and 
the  right  of  ownership  upon  their  lighter  shade  of  complexion  and 
coined  the  contemptible  epithet  “Negro,”  originally  applied  to  that 
branch  of  the  Ethiopian  race  dwelling  in  the  valley  of  the  river  Niger, 
as  a fitting  designation  for  a race  whom  they  had  determined  to 
dehumanize. 

If  that  name  is  applicable  to  the  dwellers  in  the  valley  of  the 
Niger,  it  is  no  more  applicable  to  the  rest  of  the  Ethiopian  race  than 
the  term  “English”  is  to  all  the  rest  of  the  sons  of  Japheth.  But,  in 
the  laborious  efforts  to  prove  that  the  animals  to  which  it  is  applied 
are  not  a part  of  the  Adamic  creation,  and  are  therefore  not  a part  of 
the  human  family,  a most  harmful  use  has  been  made  of  the  con- 
temptible epithet  “Negro.” 

In  making  its  victims  out  of  a race  which  had  given  the  world  its 
civilization,  slavery  could  not  be  defended;  hence,  the  most  strenuous 
efforts  have  been  made  to  falsify  the  Bible  and  distort  the  history  of 
mankind  in  attempts  to  separate  that  branch  of  the  Ethiopian  race  out 
of  which  the  slaves  were  being  made  from  the  rest  of  their  race. 

Because  of  this  damnable  use  and  purpose,  we  hate  the  word 
“Negro,”  and  will  never  be  reconciled  to  it. 

The  sons  of  Japheth,  the  last  of  Noah’s  race  to  scale  the  heights 
of  civilization,  who  were  crude  barbarians  wearing  the  skins  of  animals 

<•> 


HISTORICAL  EXTRACTS. 


63 


and  living  in  caves  while  the  sons  of  Ham  were  devising  and  develop- 
ing the  civilization  of  which  the  former  are  to-day  boasting  as  the 
product  of  the  brain  and  skill  of  their  race,  like  their  immediate  pre- 
decessors, the  sons  of  Shem,  who  had  also  borrowed  their  knowledge 
from  the  sons  of  Ham,  have  either  appropriated  the  history  of  the  sons 
of  Cush  or  refused  to  perpetuate  it ; and  therefore,  under  such  circum- 
stances, Afro-Americans  in  the  midst  of  a branch  of  the  white  race, 
with  magnified  white  ideals,  are  almost  wholly  deprived  of  any  knowl- 
edge of  the  part  which  their  great  ancestors  played  in  the  world’s  his- 
tory and  their  wonderful  contributions  to  civilization. 

In  order  that  they  may  secure  a few  glimpses  of  the  history  and 
achievements  of  their  ancestors,  the  ancient  Ethiopian  race,  we  will 
now  let  the  most  renowned  and  authentic  historians  of  the  white  race 
speak. 

ORIGIN  OF  THE  NAME  “ETHIOPIA.” 

“Ethiopia  is  derived  from  two  Greek  words,  ethein,  burnt,  and 
ops,  face,  which  means  ‘a  burnt  or  dark  face.’ 

“The  word  ‘Ethiopian’  was  originally  applied  by  the  Greeks  to  all 
people  who  lived  in  the  southern  part  of  the  known  world,  including 
the  dark-colored  natives  of  India.” — Universal  Encyclopedia. 

‘In  the  early  ages  of  the  world,  the  continent  of  Africa  was  in- 
habited by  three  distinct  original  races,  all  of  whom  are  mentioned  in 
the  Old  Testament  scriptures,  and  are  recognized  there  as  the  descend- 
ants of  Ham,  the  son  of  Noah. 

“The  first  and  most  prominent  of  these  were  the  ancient  Egypt- 
ians, who  are  regarded  as  the  descendants  of  Mizraim,  the  second  son 
of  Ham. 

“The  second  family  was  known  to  the  Greek  and  Roman  historians 
as  the  Libyan  race,  which  is  supposed  to  have  descended  from  Phut, 
the  third  son  of  Ham,  and  is  the  ancestry  of  modern  Numidian,  Maur- 
itanian, and  Berber. 

“The  third  family  was  known  to  the  Greek  and  Roman  historians 
as  the  Ethiopian  or  black  race,  who  are  regarded  as  the  descendants 
of  Cush,  the  eldest  son  of  Ham. 

“The  terms  ‘Cush’  and  ‘Ethiopia’  are  interchangeably  used  in  the 
historical  parts  of  the  Old  Testament  for  the  same  people. 

“One  of  these  terms  is  of  Hebrew  origin,  and  is  indicative  of  the 
origin  or  patronage  of  the  people,  while  the  other  is  Greek,  and  is 
descriptive  of  their  physical  character.  This  term  was  applied  both  to 
Asiatic  and  African  races. 

“The  chief  locality  of  the  African  branch  of  the  Ethiopian  family 


64 


RAGE  IDEALS . 


was  on  the  Upper  Ni  e,  what  is  known  as  Nubia  and  Abyssinia. 
From  this  family  has  undoubtedly  descended  the  modem  African  or 
Negro  race. 

“From  the  account  which  Herodotus  and  other  ancient  historians 
give  of  the  habits  and  physical  character  of  the  ancient  Ethiopian 
stock,  they  do  not  differ  essentially  from  the  modem  African  race,  a 
people  who  are  now  spread  over  two-thirds  of  the  whole  continent, 
and  are  vastly  more  numerous  than  they  ever  were  in  any  previous 
period  of  their  history.” — Wilsons  “Western  Africa ” Part  I.,  Chap. 
/.,  page  14. 

“When  I visited  the  Sphinx,  I could  not  help  thinking  the  figure 
of  that  monster  furnished  the  true  solution  of  the  enigma ; when  I saw 
its  features  precisely  those  of  a Negro,  I recollected  the  remarkable 
passage  of  Herodotus,  in  which  he  says,  ‘For  my  part,  I believe  the 
Colc-hi  to  be  a colony  of  Egyptians,  because,  like  them,  they  have 
black  skins  and  frizzled  hair.” — Volney , the  French  Traveler  and 
Historian. 

“That  is,  that  the  ancient  Egyptians  were  real  Negroes  of  the 
same  species  with  all  the  nations  of  Africa.” — Herodotus,  Liber  II. 

“The  ancient  Egyptians  had  the  character  of  being  the  tallest  and 
handsomest  nation  in  the  world.” — Herodotus,  Liber  III.,  Chap.  XX., 
page  114. 

“In  the  earliest  tradition  of  nearly  all  the  more  civilized  nations 
of  antiquity  the  name  of  this  distant  people  is  found. 

“The  annals  of  the  Egyptian  priests  were  full  of  them : the  na- 
tions of  inner  Asia,  on  the  Euphrates  and  Tigris,  have  interwoven  the 
fictions  of  the  Ethiopians  with  their  own  traditions  of  the  conquest 
and  wars  of  their  heroes;  and  at  a period  equally  remote  they  glimmer 
in  Grecian  mythology.  When  the  Greeks  scarcely  knew  Italy  and 
Sicily  by  name,  the  Ethiopians  were  celebrated  in  the  verses  of  their 
poets;  they  spoke  of  them  as  ‘the  remotest  nation,’  ‘the  most  just  of 
men’;  the  favorites  of  the  gods.” — Hereen’s  “ Historical  Researches ” 
Vol.  I.,  page  293. 

“How  we  are  astonished  when  we  reflect  that  to  the  race  of 
Negroes,  at  present  our  slaves  and  the  objects  of  our  extreme  contempt, 
we  owe  our  arts,  sciences,  and  even  the  very  vise  of  speech.” — Volney. 
Vol.  I.,  Chap.  III. 

“The  ruins  of  Thebes,  that  ancient  and  celebrated  town,  these 
heaps  of  ruins,  laved  by  the  Nile,  are  all  that  remains  of  the  opulent 
cities  that  gave  luster  to  Ethiopia.  It  was  there  that  a people,  since 
forgotten,  discovered  the  elements  of  science  and  art  at  a time  when 
all  other  men  were  barbarous,  and  when  a race,  now  regarded  as  the 


HISTORICAL  EXTRACTS. 


05 


refuse  of  society,  explored  among  the  phenomena  of  nature  those  civil 
and  religious  systems  which  have  since  held  mankind  in  awe.” 

Count  de  Gobineau,  whose  purpose  did  not  require  him  to  depre- 
date the  black  race,  takes  a very  different  view  of  it.  He  maintains 
that  in  the  great  civilizations  of  antiquity  the  inspiration  of  poetry 
and  art  came  from  that  race. 

He  says:  “The  white  race  organized  those  civilization  and  es- 

tablished their  laws  and  governments;  but  the  source  from  whence 
their  art  issued  was  foreign  to  the  instincts  of  the  organizing  civilizers 
it  lay  in  the  blood  of  the  blacks.  That  universal  power  of  imagination 
which  we  see  enveloping  and  penetrating  the  primordial  civilizations 
came  entirely  from  the  everlasting  infusion  of  blood  from  the  black 
race  into  that  of  the  whites.” 

Again  he  says:  “The  Negro  possesses,  in  a high  degree,  the 

faculty  of  emotion  from  the  senses,  without  which  art  is  not  possible.” 

Once  more  he  says : “It  will  be  said  that  I am  placing  a beauti- 
ful crown  upon  the  deformed  head  of  the  Negro,  and  doing  him  a 
great  honor  by  thus  associating  him  with  the  harmonious  choir  of  the 
Muses.  But  the  honor  is  not  so  great.  I have  not  associated  him  with 
the  highest,  those  in  whom  reflection  is  superior  to  passion.” 

He  says  finally:  “Certainly  the  black  element  is  indispensable 

to  the  development  of  artistic  genius  in  a race.”  [De  Gobineau’s 
work,  “Sur  le  Inegalite  des  Races  Humaines,”  Book  II.,  Chap.  VII.]  — 
Baldwin’s  ‘‘Prehistoric  Nations,”  page  3ip. 

“That  among  its  [Babylon's]  earliest  rulers  was  a great  conquer- 
ing monarch  named  Nimrod;  that  this  monarch,  and  therefore  prob- 
ably his  people,  descended  from  Cush;  that  it  was  Cushite  or  Ethi- 
opian.— Rawlinson’s  ‘‘Egypt  and  Babylon,”  Chap.  I.,  page  2. 

“Early  in  this  period  Cushite  colonies  were  established  in  the 
valley  of  the  Nile  and  of  the  Euphrates,  which  in  subsequent  ages  be- 
came Barbary,  Egypt,  and  Chaldea. 

“Its  beginning  could  not  have  been  later  than  7,000  or  8,000 
years  B.  C.,  and  it  may  have  been  much  earlier.  ...  In  this 
period  were  the  grandest  ages  of  the  great  empire  of  Ethiopia.” — 
Baldwin’s  “Prehistoric  Nations,”  page  97. 

“The  doctrines  relative  to  superior  and  inferior  races  as  usually 
inculcated  are  not  the  product  of  serene  science,  nor  of  any  calm  in- 
fluence of  reason. 

“They  have  either  sprung  from  the  arrogant  egotism  of  that  as- 
sumed superiority,  or  from  zeal  in  behalf  of  some  institution  or  of 
some  form  of  social  or  political  organization,  by  which  undeveloped 


66 


RACE  IDEALS. 


races  or  humiliated  people  are  maltreated  and  tyrannously  oppressed.” 
— Baldwin’s  “ Prehistoric  Nations,”  page  316. 

“This  antiquity  of  civilization  in  Arabia  is  necessary  to  explain 
the  facts  in  the  oldest  recorded  traditions. 

“Arabia  is  the  land  of  Cush,  the  celebrated  Ethiopia  of  very  re- 
mote lines,  and  that,  according  to  the  testimony  of  linguistic  and 
archaeological  science,  the  first  civilizers  in  western  and  southwestern 
Asia  and  the  valley  of  the  Nile  were  a people  described  as  Cushites 
or  Hamites. 

“These  facts  are  incontestable;  but  while  it  is  necessary  to  accept 
what  they  signify,  we  have  no  chronology  for  the  scheme  of  Arabian 
history  which  they  suggest.” — Baldwin’s  “ Prehistoric  Nations,”  page 
?6. 

[Thus  it  is  seen  that  though  the  modem  historian  may  attempt 
to  distort  the  truth  and  deny  the  descendants  of  Ethiopia  their  right- 
ful place  in  history,  there  shines  a radiance  from  their  ancestors’ 
achievements  in  remotest  antiquity,  giving  light,  form,  shape,  and 
color  to  everything  which  their  detractors  claim  now. 

No  blasphemous  envy  nor  jealous  power  has  been  able  to  oblit- 
erate the  luminous  grandeur  of  the  lights,  illuminating  the  footprints 
of  man,  which  they  kindled  on  the  hill-tops  of  civilization,  and  which 
are  as  far  out  of  the  destroying  wish  of  the  little  conceited  and  egois- 
tic historian  as  that  of  the  king  of  day. 

The  index  finger  of  all  history  points  the  wanderer  in  the  his- 
torical wilderness  back  to  Egypt,  and  beyond  that  to  Ethiopia,  as  the 
beginning  of  all  that  is  grandest  and  best  in  human  affairs. 

The  illustrious  forefathers  of  the  Ethiopian  race  not  only  left 
everlasting  monuments  of  their  prowess,  but  impressed  their  physical 
likeness  on  them  with  such  exactness  and  perfection  that  no  unprej- 
udiced eye  can  mistake  their  origin. — The  Author.] 

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